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UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 
AT  LOS  ANGELES 


5'  < 


GRAY   DAYS   AND    GOLD 


^><^m 


GRAY   DAYS   AND 
GOLD 

IN  ENGLAND  AND  SCOTLAND 

BY 
WILLIAM   WINTER 

NEW  EDITION 


BOSTON 

JOSEPH    KNIGHT   COMPANY 

PUBLISHERS 


Copyright,  1892, 
By  MACMILLAN  AND  CO. 


•^  J,*  Set  up  and  electrotyped  June,  1892.  Reprinted 
.  .,  November,  1892;  January^  June,  August,  1893;  April, 
.'   '  ^894. 


NorojooU  5Press: 
J.  8.  CushiiiR  &  Co.  —  Berwick  &  Si 
Boston,  Mass.,  U.S.A. 


YV73gr 

TO 

REMEMBERING  A  FRIENDSHIP 

OF  MANY  YEARS 

I  DEDICATE  THIS   BOOK 


"Est  animus  tibi 
J  Rerumque  prudens,  et  secundis 

K^  Temporibus  dubiisque  rectus  " 


207187 


PKEFACE. 


This  book,  a  companion  to  "  Shake- 
speare's England,"  relates  to  the  gray  days 
of  an  American  wanderer  in  the  British 
islands,  and  to  the  gold  of  thought  and 
fancy  that  can  he  found  there.  In  "  Shake- 
speare's England"  an  attempt  was  made  to 
depict,  in  an  unconventional  manner,  those 
lovely  scenes  that  are  intertwined  with  the 
name  and  the  memory  of  Shakespeare,  and 
also  to  reflect  the  spirit  of  that  English 
scenery  in  general  which,  to  an  imaginative 
mind,  must  always  he  venerable  with  historic 
antiquity  and  tenderly  hallowed  idth  poetic 
and  romantic  associatioii.  The  present 
hook  continues  the  same  treatment  of  kin- 
dred themes,  referring  not  only  to  the  land 
of  Shakespeare  hut  to  the  land  of  Burns  and 

7 


8  PREFACE. 

Scott.  After  so  much  had  been  done,  and 
superbly  done,  by  Washington  Irving  and  by 
other  authors,  to  celebrate  the  beauties  of 
our  ancestral  home,  it  was  perhaps  an  act 
of  presumption  on  the  part  of  the  present 
writer  to  touch  those  subjects.  He  can  only 
plead,  in  extenuation  of  his  boldness,  an 
irresistible  impulse  of  reverence  and  affection 
for  them.  His  presefitment  of  them  can  give 
no  offence,  and  perhaps  it  may  be  found 
sufficiently  sympathetic  and  diversified  to 
awaken  and  sustain  at  least  a  momentary 
interest  in  the  minds  of  those  readers  who 
love  to  muse  and  dream  over  the  relics  of  a 
storied  past.  If  by  Happy  fortune  it  shotdd 
do  more  than  that,  —  if  it  should  help  to 
imptress  his  countrymen,  so  many  of  whom 
annually  travel  in  Great  Britain,  with  the 
superlative  importance  of  adorning  the  phys- 
ical aspect  and  of  refining  the  material 
civilisation  of  America  by  a  reproduction 
within  its  borders  of  whatever  is  valuable  in 
the  long  experience  and  whatever  is  noble 
and  beautiful  in  the  domestic  and  religious 


PREFACK.  9 

spirit  of  the  British  islands^  — his  labour  will 
not  have  been  in  vain.  TJie  supreme  need 
of  this  age  in  America  is  a  practical  convic- 
tion that  progress  does  not  consist  in  mate- 
rial prosperity  but  in  spiritual  advance- 
ment. Utility  has  long  been  exclusively 
loorshipped.  The  welfare  of  the  future  lies 
in  the  worship  of  beauty.  To  that  worship 
these  pages  are  devoted.,  with  all  that  it  im- 
plies of  sympathy  with  the  higher  instincts 
and  faith  in  the  divine  destiny  of  the  human 
race. 

Many  of  the  sketches  here  assembled  were 
originally  printed  in  the  New  York  Tribune., 
with  which  journal  their  author  has  been 
continuously  associated  as  a  contributor 
since  1865.  They  have  been  revised  for  pub- 
lication in  this  form.  Most  of  the  paper  on 
Sir  Walter  Scott  first  appeared  in  Harper's 
Weekly.,  for  which  periodical  also  the  author 
has  written  many  things.  TJie  paper  on  the 
Wordsworth  country  was  contributed  to  the 
New  York  Mirror.  The  alluring  field  of 
Scottish  antiquity  and  romance,  which  the 


lO  PREFACE. 

author  has  ventured  but  slightly  to  touchy 
may  perhaps  he  explored  hereafter^  for  treas- 
ures of  contemplation  that  earlier  seekers 
have  left  ungathered.  The  fact  is  recorded 
that  an  important  recent  hook  called  Shake- 
speare''s  True  Life,  written  by  James  Walter, 
incorporates  into  its  text,  without  credit, 
several  passages  of  original  description  and 
reflection  taken  from  the  present  writers 
sketches  of  the  Shakespeare  country,  and  also 
quotes,  as  his  work,  an  elaborate  narrative 
of  a  nocturnal  visit  to  Anne  Ilathaivay's 
cottage,  which  he  never  wrote  and  never 
claimed  to  have  written.  Tliis  statement  is 
made  as  a  safeguard  against  future  in- 
justice. jY.  W. 


contents; 

— • — 

CHAP.  PAGE 

I.      CLASSIC    SHRINES      ....  15 

II.      HAUNTED   GLENS  AND   HOUSES        ,  27 

III.  OLD   YORK 40 

IV.  THE  HAUNTS   OF   MOORE            .           .  55 
V.      BEAUTIFUL   BATH     -           .                       .72 

VI.      THE    LAND   OF   WORDSWORTH           .  80 
VII.      SHAKESPEARE     RELICS     AT     WOR- 
CESTER    98 

VIII.      BYRON  AND  HUCKNALL-TORKARD,  109 

IX.      HISTORIC    NOOKS  AND   CORNERS     .  133 

X.      SHAKESPEARE'S   TOWN    .           .           .  142 

XI,      UP  AND  DOWN   THE  AVON       .           .  167 

XII.      RAMBLES   IN   ARDBN          .           .           .  175 


CONTENTS. 


CHAP.  PAGE 

XIII.  THE  STRATFORD  FOUNTAIN  .      183 

XIV.  BOSWORTH  FIELD            .           .  .      195 
XV.  THE  HOME  OP  DR.   JOHNSON  .      209 

XVI.  FROM   LONDON   TO   EDINBURGH  .      224 

XVII.  INTO  THE  HIGHLANDS  .           .  .      233 

XVni.  HIGHLAND   BEAUTIES     .           .  .      241 

XIX.  THE  HEART   OF  SCOTLAND  .  .      253 

XX.  SIR  WALTER  SCOTT        .           .  .      269 

XXI.  ELEGIAC   MEMORIALS     .           .  .296 

XXII.  SCOTTISH  PICTURES       .           .  .      308 

XXIII.  IMPERIAL  RUINS    .           .           .  .315 

XXIV.  THE  LAND   OF  MARMION         .  .     324 


"  Whatever  withdraws  us  frojn  the  power  of 
our  senses,  whatever  makes  the  past,  the  distant, 
or  the  fj4ture predominate  over  the  present,  ad- 
vances us  in  the  dignity  of  thinking  beings.  .  .  . 
AU  travel  has  its  advantages.  If  the  passenger 
visits  better  countries  he  may  learn  to  itnprove 
his  own,  and  if  fortune  carries  him  to  worse 
he  may  lear7i  to  enjoy  it." —  Dr.  Johnson. 


"  There  is  given. 
Unto  the  things  of  earth  which  Time  hath  bent, 
A  spirit's  feeling ;  afid  where  he  hath  leant 
His  ha7id,  bid  broke  his  scythe,  there  is  a  power 
And  magic  in  the  ruined  battlement, 
For  which  the  palace  of  the  present  hour 
Must  yield  its  pomp,  and  wait  till  ages  are  its 
dower'' 

Byron. 


GRAY  DAYS   AND   GOLD. 


CLASSIC    SHRINES. 

LONDON,  June  29,  1888.  —  The  poet 
Emerson's  injunction,  "Set  not  thy' 
foot  on  graves,"  is  wise  and  right ;  and 
being  in  merry  England  in  the  montli  of 
June  it  certainly  is  your  own  fault  if  you 
do  not  fulfil  the  rest  of  the  philosophical 
commandment  and  ' '  Hear  what  wine  and 
roses  say."  Yet  the  history  of  England  is 
largely  written  in  her  ancient  churches  and 
crumbling  ruins,  and  the  pilgrim  to  historic 
and  literary  shrines  in  this  country  will 
find  it  difficult  to  avoid  setting  his  foot  on 
graves.  It  is  possible  here,  as  elsewhere,  to 
live  entirely  in  the  present ;  but  to  certain 
temperaments  and  in  certain  moods  the 
temptation  is  irresistible  to  live  mostly  in 
the  past.  I  write  these  words  in  a  house 
that  was  once  occupied  by  Nell  Gwyiin,  and 

'5 


1 6  CLASSIC    SHRINES. 

as  I  glance  into  the  garden  I  see  a  venerable 
acacia  that  was  planted  by  her  own  fair 
hands,  in  the  far-off  time  of  the  Merry- 
Monarch.  Within  a  few  days  I  have  stood 
in  the  dungeon  of  Guy  Fawkes,  in  the 
Tower,  and  sat  at  luncheon  in  a  manor- 
house  of  Warwickshire  wherein  were  once 
convened  the  conspirators  of  the  Gun- 
powder Plot,  The  newspapers  of  this 
morning  announce  that  a  monument  will 
be  dedicated  on  July  19  to  commemorate 
the  defeat  of  the  Spanish  Armada,  three 
hundred  years  ago.  Surely  it  is  not  unnat- 
ural that  some  of  us  should  live  in  the  past 
and  often  should  find  ourselves  musing  over 
its  legacies. 

One  of  the  most  sacred  spots  in  England 
is  the  churchyard  of  Stoke-Pogis.  I  revis- 
ited that  place  on  June  13  and  once  again 
rambled  and  meditated  in  that  hallowed 
haunt.  Not  many  months  ago  it  seemed 
likely  that  Stoke  Park  would  pass  into  the 
possession  of  a  sporting  ring  and  be  turned 
into  a  race-course  and  kennel.  A  track  had 
already  been  laid  there.  Fate  was  kind, 
however,  and  averted  the  final  disaster. 
Only  a  few  changes  are  to  be  noted  in  that 
part  of  the  park  which  to  the  reverent  pil- 
grim must  always  be  dear.    The  church- 


CLASSIC    SHRINES.  \^ 

yard  has  been  extended  in  front,  and  a  solid 
wall  of  flint,  pierced  by  an  oak  porch,  richly 
carved,  has  replaced  the  plain  fence,  with 
its  simple  turnstile,  that  formerly  enclosed 
that  rural  cemetery.  The  additional  land 
was  given  by  the  new  proprietor  of  Stoke 
Park,  who  wished  that  his  own  tomb  might 
be  made  in  it ;  and  this  has  been  built 
beneath  a  large  tree  not  far  from  the  en- 
trance. The  avenue  from  the  gate  to  the 
church  has  been  widened,  and  it  is  now 
fringed  with  thin  lines  of  twisted  stone; 
and  where  once  stood  only  two  or  three  rose- 
trees  there  are  now  sixty-two  —  set  in  lines 
on  either  side  of  the  path.  But  the  older 
part  of  the  graveyard  remains  michanged. 
The  yew-trees  cast  their  dense  shade,  as  of 
old.  The  quaint  porch  of  the  sacred  build- 
ing has  not  suffered  under  the  hand  of 
restoration.  The  ancient  wooden  memori- 
als of  the  dead  continue  to  moulder  above 
their  ashes.  And  still  the  abundant  ivy 
gleams  and  trembles  in  the  sunshine  and  in 
the  summer  wind  that  plays  so  sweetly  over 
the  spired  tower  and  dusky  walls  of  this 
lovely  temple  — 

**  All  green  and  wildly  fresh  without, 
But  worn  and  gray  beneath." 


l8  CLASSIC    SHRINES. 

It  would  still  be  a  lovely  church,  even  if 
it  were  not  associated  with  the  immortal 
Elegy.  I  Stood  for  a  long  time  beside  the 
tomb  of  the  noble  and  tender  poet  and 
looked  with  deep  emotion  on  the  surround- 
ing scene  of  pensive,  dream-like  beauty  — 
the  great  elms,  so  dense  of  foliage,  so 
stately  and  graceful ;  the  fields  of  deep, 
waving  grass,  golden  with  buttercups  and 
white  with  daisies;  the  many  unmarked 
mounds ;  the  many  mouldering  tombstones ; 
the  rooks  sailing  and  cawing  around  the 
tree-tops  ;  and  over  all  the  blue  sky  flecked 
with  floating  fleece.  Within  the  church 
nothing  has  been  changed.  The  memorial 
window  to  Gray,  for  which  contributions 
have  been  taken  during  several  years,  has 
not  yet  been  placed.  As  I  cast  a  farewell 
look  at  Gray's  tomb,  on  turning  to  leave 
the  churchyard,  it  rejoiced  my  heart  to  see 
that  two  American  ladies,  who  had  then 
just  come  in,  were  placing  fresh  flowers 
over  the  poet's  dust.  He  has  been  buried 
more  than  a  hundred  years — but  his  mem- 
ory is  as  bright  and  green  as  the  i^y  on  the 
tower  within  whose  shadow  he  sleeps,  and 
as  fragrant  as  the  roses  that  bloom  at  its 
base.  Many  Americans  visit  Stoke-Pogis 
churchyard ,  and  surely  no  visitor  to  the  old 


CLASSIC    SHRINES.  I9 

world,  who  knows  how  to  vahie  what  is 
best  in  its  treasures,  will  omit  that  act  of 
reverence.  The  journey  is  easy.  A  brief 
run  by  railway  from  Paddington  takes  you 
to  Slough,  which  is  near  to  Windsor,  and 
thence  it  is  a  charming  drive,  or  a  still  more 
charming  walk,  mostly  through  green,  em- 
bowered lanes,  to  the  "ivy-mantled tower," 
the  "yew-trees'  shade,"  and  the  simple 
tomb  of  Gray.  What  a  gap  there  would  be 
in  the  poetry  of  our  language  if  the  Elegy 
in  a  Country  Churchyard  were  absent 
from  it !  By  that  sublime  and  tender  rev- 
erie upon  the  most  important  of  all  subjects 
that  can  engage  the  attention  of  the  human 
mind  Thomas  Gray  became  one  of  the 
chief  benefactors  of  his  race.  Those  lines 
have  been  murmured  by  the  lips  of  sorrow- 
ing affection  beside  many  a  shrine  of  buried 
love  and  hope,  in  many  a  churchyard  all 
round  the  world.  The  sick  have  remem- 
bered them  with  comfort.  The  great  sol- 
dier, going  into  battle,  has  said  them  for  his 
solace  and  cheer.  The  dying  statesman, 
closing  his  weary  eyes  upon  this  empty 
world,  has  spoken  them  with  his  last  falter- 
ing accents,  and  fallen  asleep  with  their 
heavenly  music  in  his  heart.  Well  may  we 
pause  and  ponder  at  the  grave  of  that  di- 


20  CLASSIC    SHRINES. 

vine  poet !  Every  noble  mind  is  made 
nobler,  every  good  heart  is  made  better,  for 
the  experience  of  such  a  pilgrimage.  In 
such  places  as  these  pride  is  rebuked,  vanity 
is  dispelled,  and  the  revolt  of  the  passionate 
human  heart  is  humbled  into  meekness  and 
submission. 

There  is  a  place  kindred  with  Stoke-Pogis 
churchyard,  a  place  destined  to  become, 
after  a  few  years,  as  famous  and  as  dear  to 
the  heart  of  the  reverent  pilgrim  in  the 
footsteps  of  genius  and  pure  renown.  On 
Sunday  afternoon  (June  17)  I  sat  for  along 
time  beside  the  grave  of  Matthew  Arnold. 
It  is  in  a  little  churchyard  at  Laleham  in 
Surrey,  where  he  was  born.  The  day  was 
chill,  sombre,  and,  except  for  an  occasional 
low  twitter  of  birds  and  the  melancholy 
cawing  of  distant  rooks,  soundless  and 
sadly  calm.  So  dark  a  sky  might  mean 
November  rather  than  June  ;  but  it  fitted 
well  with  the  scene  and  with  tlie  pensive 
thoughts  and  feelings  of  the  hour.  Lale- 
ham is  a  village  on  the  south  bank  of  the 
Thames,  about  thirty  miles  from  London 
and  nearly  midway  between  Staines  and 
Chertsey.  It  consists  of  a  few  devious  lanes 
and  a  cluster  of  houses,  shaded  with  large 
trees  and  everywhere  made  beautiful  with 


CLASSIC    SHRINES.  21 

flowers,  and  it  is  one  of  tliose  fortunate  and 
happy  places  to  wliicli  access  cannot  be  ob- 
tained by  railway.  There  is  a  great  house 
in  the  centre  of  it,  secluded  in  a  walled 
garden,  fronting  the  square  immediately 
opposite  to  the  village  church.  The  rest 
of  the  houses  are  mostly  cottages  made  of 
red  brick  and  roofed  with  red  tiles.  Ivy 
flourishes,  and  many  of  the  cottages  are 
overrun  with  climbing  roses.  Roman  relics 
are  found  in  the  neighbourhood  —  a  camp 
near  the  ford,  and  other  indications  of  the 
military  activity  of  Csesar.  The  church, 
All  Saints',  is  of  great  antiquity.  It  has 
been  in  part  restored,  but  its  venerable 
aspect  is  not  impaired.  The  large  low  tower 
is  of  brick,  and  this  and  the  church  walls 
are  thickly  covered  with  glistening  ivy.  A 
double-peaked  roof  of  red  tiles,  sunken  here 
and  there,  contributes  to  the  picturesque 
beauty  of  this  building,  and  its  charm  is 
further  heightened  by  the  contiguity  of 
trees,  in  which  the  old  church  seems  to 
nestle.  Within  there  are  low,  massive  pil- 
lars and  plain,  symmetrical  arches — the 
remains  of  Norman  architecture.  Great 
rafters  of  dark  oak  augment  in  this  quaint 
structure  the  air  of  solidity  and  of  an  age 
at  once   venerable  and  romantic,  while  a 


22  CLASSIC    SHRINES 

bold,  spirited,  beautiful  painting  of  Christ 
and  Peter  upon  the  sea  imparts  to  it  an  ad- 
ditional sentiment  of  sanctity  and  solemn 
pomp.  That  remarkable  work  is  by  George 
Henry  Harlow,  and  it  is  placed  back  of  the 
altar,  where  once  there  would  have  been, 
in  the  Gothic  days,  a  stained  window.  The 
explorer  does  not  often  come  upon  such  a 
gem  of  a  church  even  in  England  —  so  rich 
in  remains  of  the  old  Catholic  zeal  and 
devotion  ;  remams  now  mostly  converted 
to  the  use  of  Protestant  worship. 

The  churchyard  of  All  Saints'  is  worthy 
of  the  church  —  a  little  enclosure,  irregular 
in  shape,  surface,  shrubbery,  and  tomb- 
stones, bordered  on  two  sides  by  the  village 
square  and  on  one  by  a .  farmyard,  and 
shaded  by  many  trees,  some  of  them  yews, 
and  some  of  great  size.  Almost  every  house 
that  is  visible  near  by  is  bowered  with  trees 
and  adorned  with  flowers.  No  person  was 
anywhere  to  be  seen,  and  it  was  only  after 
inquiry  at  various  dwellings  that  the  sex- 
ton's abode  could  be  discovered  and  access 
to  the  church  obtained.  The  poet's  grave 
is  not  within  the  church,  but  in  a  secluded 
spot  at  the  side  of  it,  a  little  removed  from 
the  highway,  and  screened  from  immediate 
view  by  an  ancient  dusky  yew-tree.    I  read- 


CLASSIC    SHRINES.  23 

ily  found  it,  perceiving  a  large  wreath  of 
roses  and  a  bunch  of  white  flowers  that 
were  lying  upon  it,  — recent  offerings  of 
tender  remembrance  and  sorrowing  love, 
but  already  beginning  to  wither.  A  small 
square  of  turf,  bordered  with  white  marble, 
covers  the  tomb  of  the  poet  and  of  three  of 
his  children.i  At  the  head  are  three  crosses 
of  white  marble,  alike  in  shape  and  equal 
in  size,  except  that  the  first  is  set  upon  a 
pedestal  a  little  lower  than  those  of  the 
others.  On  the  first  cross  is  written :  "  Basil 
Francis  Arnold,  youngest  child  of  Matthew 
and  Frances  Lucy  Arnold.  Born  August  19, 
1866.  Died  January  4,  1868.  Suffer  little 
children  to  come  unto  me. ' '  On  the  second : 
' '  Thomas  Arnold,  eldest  child  of  Matthew 
and  Frances  Lucy  Arnold.  Born  July  6, 
1852.  Died  November  23,  1868.  Awake, 
thou.  Lute  and  Harp  !  I  will  awake  right 
early."  On  the  third:  "  Trevener  William 
Arnold,  second  child  of  Matthew  and  Fran- 

1  Since  these  words  were  written  a  plain  headstone 
of  white  marble  has  been  placed  on  this  spot  bearing 
the  following  inscription  :  — 

"  Matthew  i^rnold,  eldest  son  of  the  late  Thomas 
Arnold,  D.D.,  Head  Master  of  Rugby  School.  Born 
December  24,  1822.  Died  April  15,  1888.  '  There  is 
sprung  up  a  light  for  the  righteous,  and  joyful  glad- 
ness for  such  as  are  true-hearted.' " 


24  CLASSIC    SHRINES. 

ces  Lucy  Arnold.  Born  October  15,  1853. 
Died  February  16,  1872.  In  tlie  morning 
it  is  green  and  growetli  up."  Near  by  are 
otlier  tombstones  bearing  tlie  name  of  Ar- 
nold—  the  dates  inscribed  on  them  refer- 
ring to  about  the  beginning  of  this  century. 
These  mark  the  resting-place  of  some  of  the 
poet's  kindred.  His  father,  the  famous  Dr. 
Arnold  of  Rugby,  rests  in  Rugby  chapel  — 
that  noble  father,  that  true  friend  and  ser- 
vant of  humanity,  of  whom  the  son  wrote 
those  memorable  words  of  imperishable  no- 
bility and  meaning,  "Thou,  my  father, 
wouldst  not  be  saved  alone."  Matthew 
Arnold  himself  is  buried  in  the  same  grave 
with  his  eldest  son  and  side  by  side  with 
his  little  children.  He  who  was  himself  as 
a  little  child  in  his  innocence,  goodness,  and 
truth,  where  else  and  how  else  could  he  so 
fitly  rest  ?  "  Awake,  thou,  Lute  and  Harp  ! 
I  will  awake  right  early." 

Every  man  will  have  his  own  thoughts  in 
such  a  place  as  this  ;  will  reflect  upon  his 
own  afflictions,  and  from  knowledge  of  the 
manner  and  spirit  in  which  kindred  griefs 
have  been  borne  by  the  great  heart  of  intel- 
lect and  genius  will  seek  to  gather  strength 
and  patience  to  endure  them  well.  Matthew 
Arnold  taught  many  lessons  of   immense 


CLASSIC    SHRINES.  25 

value  to  those  who  are  able  to  think.  He 
did  not  believe  that  happiness  is  the  destiny 
of  the  human  race  on  earth,  or  that  there  is 
a  visible  ground  for  assuming  that  happi- 
ness in  this  mortal  condition  is  one  of  the 
inherent  rights  of  humanity.  He  did  not 
think  that  this  world  is  made  an  abode  of 
delight  by  the  mere  jocular  affirmation  that 
everything  in  it  is  well  and  lovely.  He 
ktiew  better  than  that.  But  his  message, 
delivered  in  poetic  strains  that  will  endure 
as  long  as  our  language  exists,  is  the  mes- 
sage, not  of  gloom  and  despair,  but  of  spir- 
itual purity  and  sweet  and  gentle  patience. 
The  man  who  heeds  Matthew  Arnold's 
teaching  will  put  no  trust  in  creeds  and 
superstitions,  will  place  no  reliance  upon 
the  cobweb  structures  of  theology,  will  take 
no  guidance  from  the  animal  and  unthinking 
multitude  ;  but  he  will  "  keep  the  whiteness 
of  his  soul";  he  will  be  simple,  unselfish, 
and  sweet ;  he  will  live  for  the  spirit  and 
not  the  flesh  ;  and  in  that  spirit,  pure,  ten- 
der, fearless,  strong  to  bear  and  patient  to 
suffer,  he  will  find  composure  to  meet  the 
inevitable  disasters  of  life  and  the  awful 
mystery  of  death.  Such  w^as  the  burden  of 
my  thought,  sitting  there,  in  the  gloaming, 
beside  the  lifeless  dust  of  him  whose  hand 


26  CLASSIC    SHRINES. 

had  once,  with  kindly  greeting,  been  clasped 
in  mine.  And  such  will  be  the  thought  of 
many  and  many  a  pilgrim  who  will  stand 
in  that  sacred  place,  on  many  a  summer 
evening  of  the  long  future  — 

•*  While  the  stars  come  out  and  the  night  wind 
Brings,  up  the  stream, 
Murmurs  and  scents  of  the  infinite  sea." 


HAUNTED    GLENS    AND    HOUSES.        27 


II. 

HAUNTED    GLENS   AND   HOUSES. 

WARWICK,  July  6,  1888.  —  One  night 
about  fifty  years  ago  a  brutal  murder 
was  done  at  a  louely  place  on  the  highroad 
between  Hampton  Lucy  and  Stratford- 
upon-Avon.  The  next  morning  the  mur- 
dered man  (a  farmer  named  Irons)  was 
found  lying  by  the  roadside,  his  man- 
gled head  resting  in  a  small  hole.  The 
assassins,  two  in  number,  were  shortly 
afterward  discovered,  and  they  were  hanged 
at  Warwick.  From  that  day  to  this  the 
hole  wherein  the  dead  man's  head  reposed 
remains  unchanged.  No  matter  how  often 
it  may  be  filled,  whether  by  the  wash  of 
heavy  rains  or  by  stones  and  leaves  that 
wayfarers  may  happen  to  cast  into  it  as 
they  pass,  it  is  soon  found  to  be  again 
empty.  No  one  takes  care  of  it.  No  one 
knows  whether  or  by  whom  it  is  guarded. 
Fill  it  at  nightfall  and  you  will  find  it 
empty  in  the  morning.     That  is  the  local 


28       HAUNTED    GLENS    AND   HOUSES. 

belief  and  affirmation.  This  spot  is  about 
two  miles  north  of  Stratford  and  not  dis- 
tant from  the  gates  of  Charlcote  Park.  I 
looked  at  this  hole  one  bright  day  in  June 
and  saw  that  it  was  empty.  Nature,  it  is 
thought  by  the  poets,  abhors  complicity  with 
the  concealment  of  crime  and  brands 
with  her  curse  the  places  that  are  linked 
with  the  shedding  of  blood.  Hence  that 
strong  line  in  Tom  Hood's  poem  of  Eu- 
gene Aram  — 

"  And  a  mighty  wind  had  swept  the  leaves, 
And  still  the  corse  was  bare." 

There  are  many  haunted  spots  in  War- 
wickshire. The  benighted  peasant  never 
lingers  on  Ganerslie  Heath  —  for  there,  at 
midnight,  dismal  bells  have  been  heard  to 
toll  from  Blacklow  Hill,  the  place  where  Sir 
Piers  Gaveston,  the  corrupt,  handsome,  for- 
eign favourite  of  King  Edward  the  Second, 
was  beheaded,  by  order  of  the  grim  barons 
whom  he  had  insulted  and  opposed.  The 
Earl  of  Warwick  led  them,  whom  Gaveston 
had  called  the  Black  Dog  of  Arden.  This 
was  long  ago.  Everybody  knows  the  his- 
toric incident  but  no  one  can  so  completely 
realise  it  as  when  standing  on  the  place. 
The  scene  of  the  execution  is  marked  by  a 


HAUNTED    GLENS    AND    HOUSES.       29 

simple  cross,  bearing  this  inscription  :  "In 
tlie  liollow  of  this  rock  was  beheaded,  on 
tlie  first  day  of  July  1312,  by  Barons  law- 
less as  himself,  Piers  Gaveston,  Earl  of 
Cornwall.  In  life  and  death  a  memorable 
instance  of  misrule."  No  doubt  the  birds 
were  singing  and  the  green  branches  of  the 
trees  were  waving  in  the  summer  wind  on 
that  fatal  day,  just  as  they  are  at  this 
moment.  Gaveston  was  a  man  of  much 
personal  beauty  and  some  talent,  and  only 
twenty-nine  years  old.  It  was  a  melan- 
choly sacrifice  and  horrible  in  the  circum- 
stances that  attended  it.  No  wonder  that 
doleful  thoughts  and  blood-curdling  sounds 
should  come  to  such  as  walk  on  Ganerslie 
Heath  in  the  lonely  hours  of  the  night. 

Another  haunted  place  is  Clopton  — 
haunted  certainly  with  memories  if  not 
with  ghosts.  In  the  reign  of  Henry  VII. 
this  was  the  manor  of  Sir  Hugh  Clopton, 
Lord  Mayor  of  London,  he  who  built  the 
bridge  over  the  Avon  —  across  which,  many 
a  time,  William  Shakespeare  must  have 
ridden,  on  his  way  to  Oxford  and  the  capi- 
tal. The  dust  of  Sir  Hugh  Clopton  rests 
in  Stratford  church  and  his  mansion  has 
passed  through  many  hands.  In  our  time 
it  is  the  residence  of  Sir  Arthur  Hodgson, 


30       HAUNTED    GLENS   AND    HOUSES. 

by  whom  it  was  purchased  m  1871.  It  was 
my  privilege  to  see  Cloj)ton  under  the  guid- 
ance of  its  lord,  and  a  charming  and  im- 
pressive old  house  it  is  —  full  of  quaint 
objects  and  fraught  with  singular  associa- 
tions. They  show  you  there,  among  many 
fine  paintings,  the  portrait  of  a  wild- eyed 
lady  with  thin  figau-e,  delicate  features,  long 
light  hair,  and  sensitive  countenance,  who 
in  the  far-off  Tudor  time  drowned  herself 
in  a  dismal  well,  back  of  the  mansion  — 
one  of  the  many  victims,  doubtless,  of  un- 
happy love.  And  they  show  yor.  the  por- 
trait of  still  another  Clopton  girl,  of  ancient 
times,  who  is  thought  to  have  been  acci- 
dentally buried  alive  —  because  when  it 
chanced  that  the  family  tomb  was  opened, 
a  few  days  after  her  interment,  the  corse 
was  found  to  be  turned  over  in  its  coffin 
and  to  present  indications  that  the  wretched 
victim  of  premature  burial  had,  in  her 
agonised  frenzy,  gnawed  her  own  flesh. 

It  is  the  blood-stained  corridor  of  Clop- 
ton, however,  that  most  impresses  imagi- 
nation. This  is  at  the  top  of  the  house, 
and  access  to  it  is  gained  by  a  winding 
stair  of  oak  boards,  uncarpeted,  solid,  sim- 
ple, and  consonant  with  the  times  and 
manners  that  it  represents.     Many  years 


HAUNTED   GLENS   AND    HOUSES.        3 1 

ago,  it  is  said,  a  man  was  murdered  in  a 
little  bedroom  near  the  top  of  this  stair- 
case, and  his  body  was  dragged  along 
the  corridor  to  be  secreted.  A  thin  dark 
stain,  seemingly  a  streak  of  blood,  runs 
from  the  door  of  that  bedroom  in  the  di- 
rection of  the  stairhead,  and  this  is  so 
deeply  imprinted  in  the  wood  that  it  can- 
not be  removed.  Opening  from  this  cor- 
ridor, opposite  to  the  murder-room,  is  an 
odd  apartment,  which  in  the  remote  days 
of  a  Catholic  occupant  was  used  as  an  ora- 
tory, i  In  the  early  part  of  the  reign  of 
Henry  VI.  John  Carpenter  obtained  from 
the  Bishop  of  Worcester  permission  to  es- 
tablish this  chapel.  In  1885  the  walls  of 
this  chamber  were  committed  to  the  tender 
mercies  of  a  paper-hanger,  who  presently 
discovered  on  them  several  inscriptions  in 
black  letter,  and  who  fortunately  mentioned 
his  discoveries  before  they  were  obliterated. 
Richard  Savage,  the  antiquary,  was  called 
to  examine  them,  and  by  him  they  were 
restored.  The  effect  of  those  little  patches 
of  letters  —  isles  of  significance  in  a  barren 
sea  of  wall-paper  —  is  that  of  extreme  sin- 

*  An  entry  in  the  Diocesan  Register  of  Worcester 
states  that  in  1374  John  Clopton  of  Stretforde  ob- 
tained letters  dimissory  to  the  order  of  priest. 


32        HAUNTED    GLENS    AND    HOUSES. 

gularity.  Most  of  them  are  sentences  from 
the  Bible.  All  of  them  are  devout.  One 
imparts  the  solemn  injunction :  ' '  Whether 
you  rise  yearlye  or  goe  to  bed  late,  Remem- 
ber Christ  Jesus  who  died  for  your  sake." 
[This  may  be  fomid  in  Jolm  Weever's 
Funeral  3Ionuments  :  1631.]  Clopton  has 
a  long  and  various  history.  One  of  the 
most  significant  facts  in  its  record  is  the 
fact  that  for  about  ten  months,  in  the  year 
1605,  it  was  occupied  by  Ambrose  Roke- 
wood,  of  Coldham  Hall,  Suffolk,  a  breeder 
of  race-horses,  whom  Robert  Catesby 
brought  into  the  ghastly  Gunpowder  Plot, 
in  the  reign  of  James  I.  Hither  came  Sir 
Everard  Digby,  and  Tom  and  Robert  Win- 
ter, and  the  specious  Jesuit,  Father  Garnet, 
chief  hatcher  of  the  conspiracy,  with  his 
vile  train  of  sentimental  fanatics,  on  that 
pUgrimage  of  sanctification  with  which  he 
formally  prepared  for  an  act  of  such  hide- 
ous treachery  and  wholesale  murder  as 
only  a  religious  zealot  could  ever  have  con- 
ceived. That  may  have  been  a  time  when 
the  little  oratory  of  Clopton  was  in  Cath- 
olic use.  Not  many  years  since  it  was  a 
bedroom  ;  but  one  of  Sir  Arthur  Hodgson's 
guests,  who  undertook  to  sleep  in  it,  was 
afterward  heard  to  declare  that  he  wished 


HAUNTED   GLENS    AND   HOUSES.       33 

not  ever  again  to  experience  the  hospitality 
of  that  chamber,  because  the  sounds  that 
he  had  heard  all  around  the  place  through- 
out that  night  were  of  a  most  infernal  de- 
scription. A  house  containing  many  rooms 
and  staircases,  a  house  full  of  long  corri- 
dors and  winding  ways,  a  house  so  large 
that  you  may  readily  get  lost  in  it  —  such 
is  Clopton ;  and  it  stands  in  its  own  large 
park,  removed  from  other  buildings  and 
bowered  in  trees.  To  sit  in  the  great  hall 
of  that  mansion  on  a  winter  midnight, 
when  the  snow-laden  wind  is  howling 
around  it,  and  then  to  think  of  the  bleak, 
sinister  oratory,  and  the  stealthy,  gliding 
shapes  upstairs,  invisible  to  mortal  eye, 
but  felt,  with  a  shuddering  sense  of  some 
unseen  presence  watching  in  the  dark,  — 
this  would  be  to  have  quite  a  sufficient  ex- 
perience of  a  haunted  house.  Sir  Arthur 
Hodgson  talked  of  the  legends  of  Clopton 
with  that  merry  twinkle  of  the  eye  which 
suits  well  with  kindly  incredulity.  All  the 
same  I  thought  of  Milton's  lines  — 

"  Millions  of  spiritual  creatures  walk  the  earth 
Unseen,  both  when  we  wake  and  when  we 


Warwickshire  swarmed  with  conspirators 
c 


34        HAUNTED    GLENS    AND    HOUSES. 

while  the  Gunpowder  Plot  was  in  progress. 
The  Lion  Inn  at  Dunchurch  was  the  chief 
tryst  of  the  captains  who  were  to  lead  their 
forces  and  capture  the  Princess  Elizabeth 
and  seize  the  throne  and  the  country  after 
the  expected  explosion  —  which  never  came. 
And  when  the  game  was  up  and  Pawkes  in 
captivity,  it  was  through  Warwickshire  that 
the  "racing  and  chasing"  was  fleetest  and 
wildest,  till  the  desperate  scramble  for  life 
and  safety  went  down  in  blood  at  Hewel 
Grange.  Various  houses  associated  with 
that  plot  are  still  extant  in  this  neighbour- 
hood, and  when  the  scene  shifts  to  London 
and  to  Garnet's  Tyburn  gallows,  it  is  easily 
possible  for  the  patient  antiquarian  to  tread 
in  almost  every  footprint  of  that  great  con- 
spiracy. 

Since  Irish  ruffians  began  to  toss  dyna- 
mite about  in  public  buildings  it  has  been 
deemed  essential  to  take  especial  precaution 
against  the  danger  of  explosion  in  such 
places  as  the  Houses  of  Parliament,  West- 
minster Abbey,  and  the  Tower  of  London. 
Much  more  damage  than  the  newspapers 
recorded  was  done  by  the  explosions  that 
occurred  some  time  ago  in  the  Tower  and 
the  Palace.  At  present  you  cannot  enter 
even  into    Palace   Yard  unless   connected 


HAUNTED    GLENS    AND    HOUSES.        35 

with  the  public  business  or  authorised  by 
an  order  ;  and  if  you  visit  the  Tower  with- 
out a  special  permit  you  will  be  restricted 
to  a  few  sights  and  places.  I  was  fortu- 
nately the  bearer  of  the  card  of  the  Lord 
Chamberlain,  on  a  recent  prowl  through 
the  Tower,  and  therefore  was  favoured  by  - 
the  beef-eaters  who  pervade  that  structure. 
Those  damp  and  gloomy  dungeons  were 
displayed  wherein  so  many  Jews  perished 
miserably  in  the  reign  of  Edward  I. ;  and 
"Little  Ease"  was  shown  —  the  cell  in 
which  for  several  months  Guy  Fawkes  was 
incarcerated,  during  Cecil's  wily  investiga- 
tion of  the  Gunpowder  Plot.  A  part  of  the 
rear  wall  has  been  removed,  affording  access 
to  the  adjacent  dungeon  ;  but  originally 
the  cell  did  not  give  room  for  a  man  to  lie 
down  in  it,  and  scarce  gave  room  for  him  to 
stand  upright.  The  massive  door,  of  ribbed 
and  iron-bound  oak,  still  solid  though  worn, 
would  make  an  impressive  picture.  A  poor, 
stealthy  cat  was  crawling  about  in  those 
subterranean  dens  of  darkness  and  horror, 
and  was  left  locked  in  there  when  we 
emerged.  In  St.  Peter's,  on  the  green  — 
that  little  cemetery  so  eloquently  described 
by  Macaulay  —  they  came  some  time  ago 
Mpon  the  coffins  of  Lovat,  Kilmarnock,  and 


36       HAUNTED   GLENS   AND    HOUSES. 

Balmerino,  the  Scotch  lords  who  perished 
upon  the  block  for  their  complicity  witli 
the  rising  for  Charles  Edward  Stuart,  the 
Pretender,  in  1745-47.  The  coffins  were 
much  decayed.  The  plates  were  removed, 
and  these  may  now  be  viewed  in  a  glass 
case  on  the  church  wall,  just  over  against 
the  spot  where  those  unfortunate  gentlemen 
were  buried.^  One  is  of  lead  and  is  in  the 
form  of  a  large  open  scroll.  The  other  two 
are  oval  in  shape,  large,  and  made  of 
pewter.  Much  royal  and  noble  dust  is 
heaped  together  beneath  the  stones  of  the 
chancel  —  Anne  Boleyn,  Catherine  How- 
ard, Lady  Jane  Grey,  Margaret  Duchess 
of  Salisbury,  the  Duke  of  Monmouth,  the 
Earl  of  Northumberland,  Essex,  Overburj'-, 
Thomas  Cromwell,  and  many  more.  The 
body  of  the  infamous  and  execrable  Jeffreys 
was  once  buried  there,  but  it  has  been  re- 
moved. 

St.  Mary's  church  at  Warwick  has  been 
restored  since  1885,  and  now  it  is  made 
a  show  place.  You  see  the  Beauchamp 
chapel,  in  which  are  entombed  Thomas 
Beauchamp,  Earl  of  Warwick,  the  founder 

1  It  is  said,  however,  that  the  remains  of  Lord 
Lovat  were  secretly  removed  and  buried  at  his  home 
near  Inverness;  and  that  the  head  was  sewed  to  the 
body. 


HAUNTED    GLKXS    AND    HOUSES.        },'] 

of  the  church ;  Robert  Dudley,  Earl  of 
Leicester,  in  whose  Latin  epitaph  it  is 
stated  that  ' '  his  sorrowful  wife,  Laetitia, 
daughter,  of  Francis  Knolles,  through  a 
sense  of  conjugal  love  and  fidelity,  hath 
put  up  this  monument  to  the  best  and  dear- 
est of  husbands"  ;  Ambrose  Dudley,  elder 
brother  to  Elizabeth's  favourite,  and  kno\vn 
as  the  Good  Earl  (he  relinquished  his  title 
and  possessions  to  Robert)  ;  and  thatFulke 
Greville,  Lord  Brooke,  who  lives  in  fame 
as  "the  friend  of  Sir  I'hilip  Sidney."  There 
are  other  notable  sleepers  in  that  chapel,  but 
these  perhaps  are  the  most  famous  and  con- 
siderable. One  odd  epitaph  records  of 
William  Viner,  steward  to  Lord  Brooke, 
that  "he  was  a  man  entirely  of  ancient 
manners,  and  to  whom  you  will  scarcely 
find  an  equal,  particularly  in  point  of  liber- 
ality. ...  He  was  added  to  the  number 
of  the  heavenly  inhabitants  maturely  for 
himself,  but  permaturely  for  his  friends,  in 
his  70th  year,  on  the  28th  of  Aprid,  a.d. 
1639."  Another,  placed  for  himself  by 
Thomas  Hewett  during  his  lifetime,  mod- 
estly describes  him  as  "  a  most  miserable 
sinner."  Sin  is  always  miserable  when  it 
knows  itself.  Still  another,  and  this  in  good 
verse,  by  Gervas  Clifton,  gives  a  tender 


38        HAUNTED    GLENS    AND    HOUSES. 

tribute  to  Lsetitia  ("the  excellent  and 
pious  Lady  Lettice  "),  Countess  of  Leices- 
ter, who  died  on  Christmas  morning,  1634:  — 

**  She  that  in  her  younger  years 
Matched  Avith  two  great  English  peers ; 
She  that  did  supply  the  wars 
With  thunder,  and  the  Court  with  stars; 
She  that  in  her  youth  had  been 
Darling  to  the  maiden  Qvieene, 
Till  she  was  content  to  quit 
Her  favour  for  her  favourite.  .  .  . 
While  she  lived  she  lived  thus, 
Till  that  God,  displeased  with  us, 
Suffered  her  at  last  to  fall, 
Not  from  Him,  but  from  us  all." 

A  noble  bust  of  that  fine  thinker  and 
exquisite  poet  Walter  Savage  Landor  has 
been  placed  on  the  west  wall  of  St.  Mary's 
church.  He  was  a  native  of  Warwick  and 
he  is  fitly  commemorated  in  that  place. 
The  bust  is  of  alabaster  and  is  set  in  an 
alabaster  arch  with  carved  environment, 
and  with  the  family  arms  displayed  above. 
The  head  of  Landor  shows  great  intellectual 
power,  rugged  yet  gentle.  Coming  sud- 
denly upon  the  bust,  in  this  church,  one  is 
forcibly  and  pleasantly  reminded  of  the  at- 
tribute of  sweet  and  gentle  reverence  in 
the  English  character  which  so  invariably 


HAUNTED    GLENS    AND    HOUSES.        39 

expresses  itself,  all  over  this  land,  in  hon- 
ourable memorials  to  the  honourable  dead. 
No  rambler  in  Warwick  omits  to  explore 
Leicester's  hospital,  or  to  see  as  much  as 
he  can  of  the  Castle.  That  glorious  old 
place  has  long  been  kept  closed  for  fear  of 
the  dynamite  fiend ;  but  now  it  is  once 
more  accessible.  I  walked  agam  beneath 
the  stately  cedars  and  along  the  bloom- 
bordered  avenues  where  once  Joseph  Addi- 
son used  to  wander  and  meditate,  and 
traversed  again  those  opulent  state  apart- 
ments wherein  so  many  royal,  noble,  and 
beautiful  faces  look  forth  from  the  radiant 
canvas  of  Holbein  and  Vandyke.  There  is 
a  wonderful  picture,  in  one  of  those  rooms, 
of  Thomas  Wentworth,  Earl  of  Strafford, 
when  a  young  man  —  a  face  prophetic  of 
stormy  life  and  baleful  struggles  and  a  hard 
and  miserable  fate.  You  may  see  the  hel- 
met that  was  worn  by  Oliver  Cromwell,  and 
also  a  striking  death-mask  of  his  face.  The 
finest  portraits  of  King  Charles  I.  that 
exist  in  this  kingdom  are  shown  at  War- 
wick Castle. 


40  OLD    YORK. 


III. 

OLD    YORK. 

TOEK,  August  12,  1888.  — All  summer 
long  the  sorrowful  skies  liave  been 
weeping  over  England,  and  my  first  pros- 
pect of  this  ancient  city  was  a  prospect 
through  drizzle  and  mist.  Yet  even  so  it 
was  impressive.  York  is  one  of  the  quaint- 
est cities  in  the  kingdom.  Many  of  the 
streets  are  narrow  and  crooked.  Most  of 
the  buildings  are  of  low  stature,  built  of 
brick,  and  roofed  with  red  tiles.  Here  and 
there  you  find  a  house  of  Queen  Elizabeth's 
time,  picturesque  with  overhanging  timber- 
crossed  fronts  and  peaked  gables.  One 
such  house,  in  Stonegate,  is  conspicuously 
marked  with  its  date,  1574.  Another,  in 
College  street,  enclosing  a  quadrangular 
court  and  lovely  with  old  timber  and  carved 
gateway,  was  built  by  the  Neville  family  in 
1460.  There  is  a  wide  area  in  the  centre 
of  the  town  called  Parliament  street,  where 
the  market  is  opened  by  torchlight  on  cer- 


n 
V 


OLD   YORK.  41 

tain  evenings  of  every  vt^eek.  It  was 
market-time  last  evening,  and,  wandering 
through  the  motley  and  merry  crowd  that 
filled  the  square,  about  nine  o'clock,  I 
bought  at  a  flower-stall  the  white  rose  of 
York  and  the  red  rose  of  Lancaster  —  twin- 
ing them  together  as  an  emblem  of  the  set- 
tled peace  that  here  broods  so  sweetly  over 
the  venerable  relics  of  a  wild  and  stormy 
past. 

Four  sections  of  the  old  wall  of  York  are 
still  extant  and  the  observer  is  amused  to 
perceive  the  ingenuity  with  which  these 
gray  and  mouldering  remnants  of  the  feudal 
age  are  blended  into  the  structures  of  the 
democratic  present.  From  Bootham  to 
Monk  Gate  (so  named  in  honour  of  General 
Monk  at  the  Restoration),  a  distance  of 
about  half  a  mile,  the  wall  is  absorbed  by 
the  adjacent  buildings.  But  you  may  walk 
upon  it  from  Monk  Gate  to  Jewbury,  about 
a  quarter  of  a  mile,  and  afterward,  crossing 
the  Foss,  you  may  find  it  again  on  the  south- 
east of  the  city,  and  walk  upon  it  from  Eed 
Tower  to  old  Fishergate,  descending  near 
York  Castle.  There  are  houses  both  within 
the  walls  and  without.  The  walk  is  about 
eight  feet  wide,  protected  on  one  hand  by  a 
fretted  battlement  and  on  the  other  by  an 


42  OLD    YORK. 

occasional  bit  of  iron  fence.  The  "base  of 
the  wall,  for  a  considerable  part  of  its  ex- 
tent, is  fringed  with  market  gardens  or  with 
grassy  banks.  In  one  of  its  towers  there  is 
a  gate-house,  still  occupied  as  a  dwelling ; 
and  a  comfortable  dwelling  no  doubt  it  is. 
In  another,  of  which  nothing  now  remains 
but  the  walls,  four  large  trees  are  rooted ; 
and  as  they  are  already  tall  enough  to  wave 
their  leafy  tops  above  the  battlement  they 
must  have  been  growing  there  for  twenty 
years.  At  one  point  the  Great  Northern 
Railway  enters  through  an  arch  in  the  an- 
cient wall,  and  as  you  look  down  from  the 
battlements  your  gaze  rests  upon  long  lines 
of  rail  and  a  spacious  station  —  together 
with  its  adjacent  hotel ;  objects  which  con- 
sort but  strangely  with  what  your  fancy 
knows  of  York ;  a  city  of  donjons  and  bar- 
bicans, the  moat,  the  drawbridge,  the  port- 
cullis, the  citadel,  the  man-at-arms,  and  the 
knight  in  armour,  with  the  banners  of  Wil- 
liam the  Norman  flowing  over  all. 

The  river  Ouse  divides  the  city  of  York, 
which  lies  mostly  upon  its  east  bank,  and 
in  order  to  reach  the  longest  and  most  at- 
tractive portion  of  the  wall  that  is  now 
available  to  the  pedestrian  you  must  cross 
the  Ouse  either  at  Skeldergate  or  Lendal, 


OLD   YORK.  43 

paying  a  halfpenny  as  toll,  both  when  you 
go  and  when  you  return.  The  walk  here 
is  three-quarters  of  a  mile  long,  and  from 
an  angle  of  this  wall,  just  above  the  railway 
arch,  may  be  obtained  the  best  view  of  the 
mighty  cathedral  —  one  of  the  most  stupen- 
dous and  sublime  works  that  ever  were 
erected  by  the  inspired  brain  and  loving 
labour  of  man.  While  I  walked  there  last 
night,  and  mused  upon  the  story  of  the 
Wars  of  the  Roses,  and  strove  to  conjure 
up  the  pageants  and  the  horrors  that  must 
have  been  presented  all  about  this  region  in 
that  remote  and  turbulent  past,  the  glorious 
bells  of  the  minster  were  chiming  from  its 
towers,  while  the  fresh  evening  breeze, 
sweet  with  the  fragrance  of  wet  flowers  and 
foliage,  seemed  to  flood  this  ancient,  vener- 
able city  with  the  golden  music  of  a  celes- 
tial benediction. 

The  pilgrim  to  York  stands  in  the  centre 
of  the  largest  shire  in  England  and  is  sur- 
rounded with  castles  and  monasteries,  now 
mostly  in  ruins  but  teeming  with  those 
associations  of  history  and  literature  that 
are  the  glory  of  this  delightful  land.  From 
the  summit  of  the  great  central  tower  of 
the  cathedral,  which  is  reached  by  two  hun- 
dred and  thirty-seven  steps,  I  gazed  out 


44  OLD    YORK. 

over  the  vale  of  York  and  beheld  one  of  the 
loveliest  spectacles  that  ever  blessed  the 
eyes  of  man.  The  wind  was  fierce,  the  sun 
brilliant,  and  the  vanquished  storm-clouds 
were  streaming  away  before  the  northern 
blast.  Far  beneath  lay  the  red- roofed  city, 
its  devious  lanes  and  its  many  gray  churches 
—  crumbling  relics  of  ancient  ecclesiastical 
power  —  distinctly  visible.  Through  the 
plain,  and  far  away  toward  the  south  and 
east,  ran  the  silver  thread  of  the  Ouse, 
while  all  around,  as  far  as  the  eye  could 
reach,  stretched  forth  a  smiling  landscape 
of  emerald  meadow  and  cultivated  field ; 
here  a  patch  of  woodland,  and  there  a  silver 
gleam  of  wave  ;  here  a  manor-house  nestled 
amid  stately  trees,  and  there  an  ivy-covered 
fragment  of  ruined  masonry ;  and  every- 
where the  green  lines  of  the  flowering 
hedge.  The  prospect  is  finer  here  than 
even  it  is  from  the  summit  of  Strasburg 
cathedral ;  and  indeed,  when  all  is  said 
that  can  be  said  about  natural  scenery  and 
architectural  sublimities,  it  seems  amazing 
that  any  lover  of  the  beautiful  should  deem 
it  necessary  to  quit  the  infinite  variety  of 
the  British  islands.  Earth  cannot  show 
you  anything  more  softly  fair  than  the 
lakes  and  mountains  of  Cumberland  and 


OLD   YORK.  45 

Westmoreland.  No  city  can  excel  Edin- 
burgh in  stately  solidity  of  character  or 
tranquil  grandeur,  or  in  magnificence  of 
jjosition.  The  most  exquisitely  beautiful 
of  churches  is  Roslin  chapel.  And  though 
you  search  the  wide  world  through  you  will 
never  find  such  cathedrals  —  so  fraught  with 
majesty,  sublimity,  the  loveliness  of  human 
art,  and  the  ecstatic  sense  of  a  divine  ele- 
ment in  human  destiny  !  —  as  those  of 
York,  Canterbury,  Gloucester,  and  Lincoln. 
While  thus  I  lingered  in  wondering  medita- 
tion upon  the  crag-like  summit  of  York 
minster,  the  mufifled  thunder  of  its  vast, 
sonorous  organ  rose,  rolling  and  throbbhig, 
from  the  mysterious  depth  below,  and 
seemed  to  shake  the  gi'eat  tower  as  with  a 
mighty  blast  of  jubilation  and  worship. 
At  such  moments,  if  ever,  when  the  tones 
of  human  adoration  are  floating  up  to 
heaven,  a  man  is  lifted  out  of  himself  and 
made  to  forget  his  puny  mortal  existence 
and  all  the  petty  nothings  that  weary  his 
spirit,  darken  his  vision,  and  weigh  him 
down  to  the  level  of  the  sordid,  trivial 
world.  Well  did  they  know  this  —  those 
old  monks  who  built  the  abbeys  of  Britain, 
laying  their  fovmdations  not  alone  deeply 
in  the  earth  but  deeply  in  the  human 
soul  I 


46  OLD   YORK. 

All  the  ground  that  you  survey  from  the 
top  of  York  minster  is  classic  ground  —  at 
least  to  those  persons  whose  imaginations 
are  kindled  by  associations  with  the  stately 
and  storied  past.  In  the  city  that  lies  at 
your  feet  stood  once  the  great  Constantine, 
to  be  proclaimed  emperor  and  to  be  invested 
with  the  imperial  purple  of  Rome.  In  the 
original  York  minster  —  for  the  present  is 
the  fourth  church  that  has  been  erected 
upon  this  site  —  was  buried  that  valiant 
soldier  "Old  Siward,"  whom  "gracious 
England"  lent  to  the  Scottish  cause,  under 
Malcolm  and  Macduff,  when  time  at  length 
was  ripe  for  the  ruin  of  Glamis  and  Caw- 
dor. Close  by  is  the  field  of  Stamford 
bridge,  where  Harold  defeated  the  Danes, 
with  terrible  slaughter,  only  nine  days  be- 
fore he  himself  was  defeated  and  slain  at 
Hastings.  Southward,  following  the  line 
of  the  Ouse,  you  look  down  upon  the  ruins 
of  Clifford's  Tower,  built  by  William  the 
Conqueror,  in  1068,  and  destroyed  by  the 
explosion  of  its  powder  magazine  in  1684. 
Not  far  away  is  the  battlefield  of  Towton, 
where  the  great  Warwick  slew  his  horse 
that  he  might  fight  on  foot  and  possess  no 
advantage  over  the  common  soldiers  of  his 
force.     Henry  VI.  and  Margaret  were  wait- 


OLD    YORK.  47 

ing  in  York  for  news  of  the  event  of  that 
fatal  battle  —  which,  in  its  effect,  made 
them  exiles  and  bore  to  an  assured  suprem- 
acy the  rightful  standard  of  the  White 
Rose.  In  this  church  Edward  IV.  was 
crowned  and  Richard  III.  was  proclaimed 
king  and  had  his  second  coronation. 
Southward  you  may  see  the  open  space 
called  the  Pavement,  connecting  with  Par- 
liament street,  and  the  red  brick  church  of 
St.  Crux.  In  the  Pavement  the  Earl  of 
Northumberland  was  beheaded  for  treason 
agamst  Queen  Elizabeth  in  1572,  and  in 
St.  Crux  (one  of  Wren's  churches)  his 
remains  he  buried,  beneath  a  dark  blue 
slab,  still  shown  to  visitors.  A  few  miles 
away,  but  easily  within  reach  of  your  vision, 
is  the  field  of  Marston  Moor,  where  the  im- 
petuous Prmce  Rupert  imperilled  and  well- 
nigh  lost  the  cause  of  Charles  I.  in  1644  ; 
and  as  you  look  toward  that  fatal  spot  you 
can  almost  hear,  in  the  chamber  of  your 
fancy,  the  pseans  of  thanksgiving  for  the 
victory  that  were  uttered  in  the  church 
beneath.  Cromwell,  then  a  subordinate 
officer  in  the  Parliamentary  army,  was  one 
of  the  worshippers,  Charles  also  has  knelt 
at  this  altar.  Indeed,  of  the  fifteen  kings, 
from  William   of  Normandy  to  Henry  of 


48  OLD   YORK. 

Windsor,  whose  sculptured  efiSgies  appear 
upon  the  chancel  screen  in  York  minster, 
there  is  scarcely  one  who  has  not  wor- 
shipped in  this  cathedral. 

York  minster  has  often  been  described, 
but  no  description  can  convey  an  adequate 
impression  of  its  grandeur.  Canterbury  is 
the  lovelier  cathedral  of  the  two  —  though 
not  the  grander — and  Canterbury  possesses 
the  inestimable  advantage  of  a  spacious 
close.  It  must  be  said  also,  for  the  city  of 
Canterbury,  that  the  presence  and  influence 
of  a  great  church  are  more  distinctly  and 
delightfully  felt  in  that  place  than  they  are 
in  York.  There  is  a  more  spiritual  tone  at 
Canterbury,  a  tone  of  superior  delicacy  and 
refinement,  a  certain  aristocratic  coldness 
and  repose.  In  York  you  perceive  the 
coarse  spirit  of  a  democratic  era.  The 
walls,  that  ought  to  be  cherished  with 
scrupulous  care,  are  found  in  many  places 
to  be  defiled.  At  intervals  along  the  walks 
upon  the  banks  of  the  Ouse  you  behold 
placards  requesting  the  co-operation  of  the 
public  in  protecting  from  harm  the  swans 
that  navigate  the  river.  Even  in  the  cathe- 
dral itself  there  is  displayed  a  printed  notice 
that  the  Dean  and  Chapter  are  amazed  at 
disturbances  which  occur  in  the  nave  while 


OLD   YORK.  49 

divine  service  is  proceeding  in  the  choir. 
These  things  imply  a  rough  element  in  the 
population,  and  in  such  a  place  as  York 
such  an  element  is  exceptionally  offensive 
and  deplorable. 

It  was  said  by  the  late  Lord  Beaconsfield 
that  progress  in  the  nineteenth  century  is 
found  to  consist  chiefly  in  a  return  to  an- 
cient ideas.  There  may  be  places  to  which 
the  characteristic  spirit  of  the  present  day 
contributes  an  element  of  beauty  ;  but  if  so 
I  have  not  seen  them.  Wherever  there  is 
beauty  there  is  the  living  force  of  tradition 
to  account  for  it.  The  most  that  a  con- 
servative force  in  society  can  accomplish, 
for  the  preservation  of  an  instinct  in  favour 
of  whatever  is  beautiful  and  impressive,  is 
to  protect  what  remains  from  the  past. 
Modem  Edinburgh,  for  example,  has  con- 
tributed no  building  that  is  comparable 
with  its  glorious  old  castle,  or  with  Roslin, 
or  with  what  we  know  to  have  been  Mel- 
rose and  Dryburgh ;  but  its  castle  and  its 
chapels  are  protected  and  preserved.  York, 
in  the  present  day,  erects  a  commodious 
railway-station  and  a  sum5)tuous  hotel,  and 
spans  its  ample  river  with  two  splendid 
bridges ;  but  its  modern  architecture  is 
puerile  beside  that  of  its  ancient  mmster  j 

D 


50  OLD   YORK. 

and  so  its  best  work,  after  all,  is  the  pres- 
ervation of  its  cathedral.  One  finds  it  diffi- 
cult to  understand  how  anybody,  however 
lowly  born  or  poorly  endowed  or  meanly 
nurtured,  can  live  within  the  presence  of 
that  heavenly  building,  and  not  be  purified 
and  exalted  by  the  contemplation  of  so 
much  majesty,  and  by  its  constantly  irradia- 
tive  force  of  religious  sentiment  and  power. 
But  the  spirit  which  in  the  past  created 
objects  of  beauty  and  adorned  common  life 
with  visible  manifestations  of  the  celestial 
aspiration  in  human  nature  had  constantly 
to  struggle  against  insensibility  or  violence ; 
and  just  so  the  few  who  have  inherited  that 
spirit  in  the  present  day  are  compelled 
steadily  to  combat  the  hard  materialism 
and  gross  animal  proclivities  of  the  new 
age. 

What  a  comfort  their  souls  must  find  in 
such  an  edifice  as  York  minster !  What  a 
solace  and  what  an  inspiration  !  There  it 
stands,  dark  and  lonely  to-night,  but  sym- 
bolising, as  no  other  object  upon  earth  can 
ever  do,  except  one  of  its  own  great  kindred, 
God's  promise  of  immortal  life  to  man  and 
man's  unquenchable  faith  in  the  promise  of 
God.  Dark  and  lonely  now,  but  during 
many  hours  of  its  daily  and  nightly  life 


OLD    YORK.  51 

sentient,  eloquent,  vital,  participating  in  all 
the  thought  and  conduct  and  experience  of 
those  who  dwell  around  it.  The  beautiful 
peal  of  its  bells  that  I  heard  last  night  was 
for  Canon  Baillie,  one  of  the  oldest  and 
most  beloved  and  venerated  of  its  clergy. 
This  morning,  sitting  in  its  choir,  I  heard 
the  tender,  thoughtful  eulogy  so  simply  and 
sweetly  spoken  by  the  aged  Dean,  and  once 
again  learned  the  essential  lesson  that  an 
old  age  of  grace,  patience,  and  benignity 
means  a  pure  heart,  an  unselfish  spirit,  and 
a  good  life  passed  in  the  service  of  others. 
This  afternoon  I  had  a  place  among  the 
worshippers  that  thronged  the  nave  to  hear 
the  special  anthem  chanted  for  the  deceased 
Canon ;  and,  as  the  organ  pealed  forth  its 
mellow  thunder,  and  the  rich  tones  of  the 
choristers  swelled  and  rose  and  broke  in 
golden  waves  of  melody  upon  the  groined 
arches  and  vaulted  roof,  my  soul  seemed 
borne  away  to  a  peace  and  rest  that  are  not 
of  this  world.  To-night  the  rising  moon, 
as  she  gleams  through  drifting  clouds,  will 
pour  her  silver  rays  upon  that  great  east 
window  —  at  once  the  largest  and  the  most 
beautiful  in  existence  —  and  all  the  Bible 
stories  told  there  in  such  exquisite  hues 
and  forms  will  glow  with  heavenly  lustre 


52  OLD   YORK. 

on  the  dark  vista  of  chancel  and  nave. 
And  when  the  morning  comes  the  first 
beams  of  the  rising  sun  will  stream  through 
the  great  casement  and  illumine  the  figures 
of  saints  and  archbishops,  and  gild  the  old 
tattered  battle-flags  in  the  chancel  aisle, 
and  touch  with  blessing  the  marble  effigies 
of  the  dead ;  and  we  who  walk  there,  re- 
freshed and  comforted,  shall  feel  that  the 
vast  cathedral  is  indeed  the  gateway  to 
heaven. 

York  minster  is  the  loftiest  of  all  the 
English  cathedrals,  and  the  second  in  length 
—  Winchester  being  thirty  feet  longer.  The 
present  structure  is  six  hundred  years  old, 
and  two  hundred  years  were  occupied  in 
the  building  of  it.  They  show  you,  in  the 
crypt,  some  fine  remains  of  the  Norman 
church  that  preceded  it  upon  the  same  site, 
together  with  traces  of  the  still  older  Saxon 
church  that  preceded  the  Norman.  The 
first  one  was  of  wood  and  was  totally  de- 
stroyed. The  Saxon  remains  are  a  frag- 
ment of  stone  staircase  and  a  piece  of  wall 
built  in  the  ancient ' '  herring-bone  ' '  fashion. 
The  Norman  remains  are  four  clustered 
columns,  embellished  in  the  dog-tooth  style. 
There  is  not  much  of  commemorative  statu- 
ary at  York  minster,  and  what  there  is  of 


OLD   YORK.  53 

it  was  placed  chiefly  in  tlie  chancel.  Arch- 
bishop Scrope,  who  figures  in  Shakespeare's 
historical  play  of  Henry  /F.,  was  buried 
in  the  lady  chapel.  Laurence  Sterne's 
grandfather,  who  was  chaplain  to  Laud,  is 
represented  there,  in  his  ecclesiastic  dress, 
reclining  upon  a  couch  and  supporting  his 
mitred  head  upon  his  hand  —  a  squat  figTire 
uncomfortably  posed,  but  sculptured  with 
delicate  skill.  Many  historic  names  occur 
in  the  inscriptions  —  Wentworth,  Finch, 
Fenwick,  Carlisle,  and  Heneage,  —  and  in 
the  north  aisle  of  the  chancel  is  the  tomb 
of  "William  of  Hatfield,  second  son  of 
Edward  III.,  who  died  m  1343-44,  in  the 
eighth  year  of  his  age.  An  alabaster  statue 
of  the  royal  boy  reclines  upon  his  tomb. 
In  the  cathedral  library,  which  contains 
eight  thousand  volumes  and  is  kept  at  the 
Deanery,  is  the  Princess  Elizabeth's  prayer- 
book,  containing  her  autogi-aph.  In  one  of 
the  chapels  is  the  original  throne-chair  of 
Edward  III. 

In  St.  Leonard's  Place  still  stands  the 
York  theatre,  erected  by  Tate  Wilkinson 
in  1765.  In  York  Castle  Eugene  Aram 
was  imprisoned  and  suffered.  Knares- 
borough,  the  scene  of  his  crime,  is  but  a 
few  miles  distant.     The  poet  Porteous,  the 


54  OLD   YORK 

sculptor  Flaxman,  and  the  fanatic  Guy 
Fawkes,  were  natives  of  York,  and  have 
often  walked  its  streets.  Standing  on 
Skeldergate  bridge,  few  readers  of  English 
fiction  could  fail  to  recall  that  exquisite 
description  of  the  place  in  the  novel  of 
JVo  Name.  In  his  artistic  use  of  weather, 
atmosphere,  and  colour  Wilkie  Collins  is 
always  remarkable  equally  for  his  fidelity 
to  nature  and  fact,  and  for  the  felicity  and 
beauty  of  his  language.  His  portrayal  of 
York  seems  more  than  ever  a  gem  of  liter- 
ary art,  when  you  have  seen  the  veritable 
spot  of  poor  Magdalen's  meeting  with  Cap- 
tain Wragge.  The  name  of  Wragge  is  on 
one  of  the  signboards  in  the  city.  The 
river,  on  which  I  did  not  omit  to  take  a 
boat,  was  picturesque,  with  its  many  quaint 
barges,  bearing  masts  and  sails  and  embel- 
lished with  touches  of  green  and  crimson 
and  blue.  There  is  no  end  to  the  associa- 
tions and  suggestions  of  the  storied  city. 
But  you  are  weary  of  them  by  this  time. 
Let  me  respect  the  admonition  of  the  mid- 
night bell,  and  seek  repose  beneath  the 
hospitable  wing  of  the  old  Black  Swan  in 
Coney  street,  whence  I  send  this  humble 
memorial  of  ancient  York. 


THE    HAUNTS    OF    MOORE.  55 


IV. 

THE    HAUNTS   OF    MOORE. 

DEVIZES,  Wiltshire,  August  20,  1888. 
—  The  scarlet  discs  of  the  poppies  and 
tlie  red  and  white  blooms  of  the  clover, 
together  with  wild-flowers  of  many  hues, 
bespangle  now  the  emerald  sod  of  England, 
while  the  air  is  rich  with  fragrance  of  lime- 
trees  and  of  new-mown  hay.  The  busy  and 
sagacious  rooks,  fat  and  bold,  wing  their 
way  in  great  clusters,  bent  on  forage  and 
mischief.  There  is  almost  a  frosty  chill  in 
the  autumnal  air,  and  the  brimming  rivers, 
dark  and  deep  and  smoothly  flowing  through 
the  opulent,  cultivated,  and  park-like  re- 
gion of  Wiltshire,  look  cold  and  bright. 
In  many  fields  the  hay  is  cut  and  stacked. 
In  others  the  men,  and  often  the  women, 
armed  with  rakes,  are  tossing  it  to  dry  in 
the  reluctant,  intermittent,  bleak  sunshine 
of  this  rigorous  August.  Overhead  the  sky 
is  now  as  blue  as  the  deep  sea  and  now  grim 
and  ominous  with  great  drifting  masses  of 


56  THE    HAUNTS    OF    MOORE. 

slate-coloured  cloud.  There  are  moments 
of  beautiful  sunshine  by  day,  and  in  some 
hours  of  the  night  the  moon  shines  forth  in 
all  her  pensive  and  melancholy  glory.  It  is 
a  time  of  exquisite  loveliness,  and  it  has 
seemed  a  fitting  time  for  a  visit  to  the  last 
English  home  and  the  last  resting-place  of 
the  poet  of  loveliness  and  love,  the  great 
Irish  poet  Thomas  Moore. 

When  Moore  first  went  up  to  London,  a 
young  author  seeking  to  launch  his  earliest 
writings  upon  the  stream  of  contemporary 
literature,  he  crossed  from  Dublin  to  Bristol 
and  then  travelled  to  the  capital  by  way  of 
Bath  and  Devizes  ;  and  as  he  crossed  sev- 
eral times  he  must  soon  have  gained  famili- 
arity with  this  part  of  the  country.  He 
did  not,  however,  settle  in  Wiltshire  until 
some  years  afterward.  His  first  lodging 
in  London  was  a  front  room,  up  two  pair 
of  stairs,  at  No.  44  George  Street,  Portman 
Square.  He  slibsequently  lived  at  No.  46 
Wigmore  Street,  Cavendish  Square,  and  at 
No.  27  Bury  Street,  St.  James's.  This  was 
in  1805.  In  1810  he  resided  for  a  time  at 
No.  22  Molesworth  Street,  Dublin,  but  he 
soon  returned  to  England.  One  of  his 
homes,  shortly  after  his  marriage  with 
Elizabeth  Dyke  ("Bessie,"  the  sister  of  the 


THE    HAUNTS    OF    MOORE.  57 

great  actress  Mary  Duff)  was  in  Brompton. 
In  the  spring  of  1812  he  settled  at  Kegworth, 
but  a  year  later  he  is  found  at  Mayfield 
Cottage,  near  Ashbourne,  Derbyshire.  "I 
am  now  as  you  wished,"  he  wrote  to  Mr. 
Power,  the  music-publisher,  July  1,  1813, 
"within  twenty -four  hours'  drive  of  town." 
In  1817  he  occupied  a  cottage  near  the  foot 
of  Muswell  Hill,  at  Hornsey,  Middlesex, 
but  after  he  lost  his  daughter  Barbara,  who 
died  there,  the  place  became  distressful  to 
him  and  he  left  it.  In  the  latter  part  of 
September  that  year,  the  time  of  their 
affliction,  Moore  and  his  Bessie  were  the 
guests  of  Lady  Donegal  at  No.  56  Davies 
Street,  Berkeley  Square,  London.  Then 
they  removed  to  Sloperton  Cottage,  at 
Bromham,  near  Devizes  (November  19, 
1817),  and  their  permanent  residence  was 
established  in  that  place.  Lord  Lansdowne, 
one  of  the  poet's  earliest  and  best  friends, 
was  the  owner  of  this  estate,  and  doubtless 
he  was  the  impulse  of  Moore's  resort  to  it. 
The  present  Lord  Lansdowne  still  owns 
Bowood  Park,  about  four  miles  away. 

Devizes  impresses  you  with  the  singular 
sense  of  being  a  place  in  which  something 
is  always  about  to  happen  ;  but  nothing 
ever  does  happen  m  it,  or  ever  will.   Quieter 


58  THE    HAUNTS    OF    MOORE. 

it  could  not  be  unless  it  were  dead.  The 
principal  street  in  it  runs  nearly  northwest 
and  southeast.  There  is  a  Northgate  at 
one  end  of  it  and  a  Southgate  at  the  other. 
Most  of  the  streets  are  narrow  and  crooked. 
The  houses  are  low,  and  built  of  brick. 
Few  buildings  are  pretentious.  A  canal 
intersects  the  place,  but  in  such  a  subterra- 
nean and  furtive  manner  as  scarcely  to 
attract  even  casual  notice.  Public-houses 
are  sufificiently  numerous  and  they  appear 
to  be  sufficiently  prosperous.  Even  while 
I  write,  the  voice  of  song,  issuing  some- 
what discordantly  from  one  of  them  in  this 
immediate  neighbourhood,  declares,  with 
beery  emphasis,  that  "  Britons  never,  never, 
never  will  be  slaves."  Close  by  stands  a 
castle  —  a  new  one,  built,  however,  upon 
the  basis  and  plan  of  an  ancient  structure 
that  was  long  included  in  the  dowry  settled 
upon  successive  Queens  of  England,  In  the 
centre  of  the  town  is  a  large  square,  which 
only  needs  a  fringe  of  well-grown  trees  to 
make  it  exceedingly  pleasant  —  for  its  com- 
modious expanse  is  seldom  invaded  by  a 
vehicle  or  a  hmnan  being.  Pilgrims  in  quest 
of  peace  could  not  do  better  than  to  tarry 
here.  Nobody  is  in  a  hurry  about  anything 
and  manners  are  primitive  and  frank. 


THE    HAUNTS    OF    MOORE.  59 

The  city  bell  which  officially  strikes  the 
hours  in  Devizes  is  subdued  and  thought- 
ful, and  although  furnished  with  chimes  it 
always  speaks  under  its  breath.  The 
church-bell,  however,  rings  long  and  heart- 
ily and  with  a  melodious  clangour  —  as 
though  the  local  sinners  were  more  than 
commonly  hard  of  hearing.  In  the  public 
square  there  are  two  works  of  art  —  one  a 
fountain,  the  other  a  market  cross.  The 
latter,  a  good  specimen  of  the  perpendicular 
Gothic,  has  thirteen  spires,  rising  above  an 
arched  canopy  for  a  statue.  One  face  of  it 
is  inscribed  as  follows ;  ' '  This  Market  Cross 
was  erected  by  Henry  Viscount  Sidmouth, 
as  a  memorial  of  his  grateful  attachment  to 
the  Borough  of  Devizes,  of  which  he  has 
been  Recorder  thirty  years,  and  of  which 
he  was  six  times  mianimously  chosen  a  rep- 
resentative in  Parliament.  Anno  Domini 
1814."  Upon  the  other  face  appears  a 
record  vastly  more  significant  —  being  indic- 
ative, as  to  the  city  fathers,  equally  of 
credulity  and  a  frugal  mind,  and  being  in  it- 
self freighted  with  tragic  import  unmatched 
since  the  Bible  narrative  of  Ananias  and 
Sapphira.     It  reads  thus  :  — 

"  The  Mayor  and  Corporation  of  Devizes 
avail  themselves  of  the  stability  of  this  build- 


6o  THE    HAUNTS    OF    MOORE. 

ing  to  transmit  to  future  times  the  record  of  an 
awful  event  which  occurred  in  this  market- 
place in  the  year  1753,  hoping  that  such  a  rec- 
ord may  serve  as  a  salutary  warning  against 
the  danger  of  impiously  invoking  the  Divine 
vengeance,  or  of  calling  on  the  holy  name  of 
God  to  conceal  the  devices  of  falsehood  and 
fraud. 

"  On  Thursday,  the  25th  January  1753,  Ruth 
Pierce,  of  Potterne,  in  this  county,  agreed, 
with  three  other  women,  to  huy  a  sack  of 
wheat  in  the  market,  each  paying  her  due  pro- 
portion toward  the  same. 

"One  of  tliese  women,  in  collecting  the  sev- 
eral quotas  of  money,  discovered  a  deficiency, 
and  demanded  of  Ruth  Pierce  the  sum  which 
was  wanted  to  make  good  the  amount. 

"  Ruth  Pierce  protested  that  she  had  paid 
her  share,  and  said,  '  Slie  wished  she  might 
drop  down  dead  if  she  had  not.' 

"  She  rashly  repeated  this  awful  wish,  when, 
to  the  consternation  of  the  surrounding  multi- 
tude, she  instantly  fell  down  and  expired, 
having  the  money  concealed  in  her  hand." 

An  interesting  church  in  Devizes  is  that 
of  St.  John,  the  Norman  tower  of  which  is 
a  relic  of  the  days  of  King  Henry  II. ,  a  vast, 
grim  structure  with  a  circular  turret  on 
one  corner  of  it.  Eastward  of  this  church 
is  a  long  and  lovely  avenue  of  trees,  and 
around  it  lies  a  large  burial-place,  remark- 


THE   HAUNTS    OF    MOORE.  6l 

able  for  the  excellence  of  the  sod  and  for  the 
number  visible  of  those  heavy,  gray,  oblong 
masses  of  tombstone  which  appear  to  have 
obtained  great  public  favour  about  the  time 
of  Cromwell.  In  the  centre  of  the  church- 
yard stands  a  monolith,  inscribed  with 
these  words :  — 

"Remember  the  Sabbath-day  to  keep  it 
holy.  —  This  moumneut,  as  a  solemn  mouitor 
to  Youug  People  to  remember  their  Creator  iu 
the  days  of  their  youth,  was  erected  by  sub- 
scrii)tiou.  —  In  memory  of  the  sudden  and  aw- 
ful end  of  Robert  Merrit  and  his  wife,  Eliz. 
Tiley,  her  sister,  Martha  Carter,  and  Josiah 
Denham,  who  were  drowned,  iu  the  flower  of 
their  youth,  in  a  pond,  near  this  town,  called 
Drews,  on  Sunday  evening,  the  30th  of  June, 
1751,  and  are  together  underneath  entombed." 

In  one  corner  of  the  churchyard  I  came 
upon  a  cross,  bearing  a  simple  legend  far 
more  solemn,  sensible,  touching,  and  ad- 
m  onitory :  "  In  Memoriam  —  Robert  Samuel 
Thomley.  Died  August  5,  1871.  Aged  48 
years.  For  fourteen  years  surgeon  to  the 
poor  of  Devizes.  '  There  shall  be  no  more 
pain.'  "  And  over  still  another  sleeper 
was  written,  upon  a  flat  stone,  low  in  the 
ground  — 

"Loving,  beloved,  in  all  relations  true. 
Exposed  to  follies,  but  subdued  by  few  : 


62  THE    HAUNTS    OF    MOORE. 

Keader,  reflect,  and  copy  if  you  can 
The  simple  virtues  of  this  honest  man." 

As  I  was  gazing  at  one  of  the  old 
cliurches,  surrounded  with  many  ponder- 
ous tombstones  and  looking  gi-ay  and  cheer- 
less in  the  gloaming,  an  old  man  approached 
me  and  civilly  began  a  conversation  about 
the  antiquity  of  the  church  and  the  elo- 
quence of  its  rector.  -  When  I  told  him  that 
I  had  walked  to  Bromham  to  attend  the  ser- 
vice there,  and  to  see  the  cottage  and  grave 
of  Moore,  he  presently  furnished  to  me  that 
little  touch  of  personal  testimony  which  is 
always  so  interesting  and  significant  in  such 
circumstances.  ' '  I  remember  Tom  Moore, ' ' 
he  said;  "  I  saw  him  when  he  was  alive.  I 
worked  for  him  once  in  his  house,  and  I  did 
some  work  once  on  his  tomb.  He  was  a 
little  man.  He  spoke  to  us  very  jDleasantly. 
I  don't  think  he  was  a  preacher.  He  never 
preached  that  I  heard  tell  of.  He  was  a 
poet,  I  believe.  He  was  very  much  liked 
here.  No,  I  never  heard  a  word  against 
him.  I  am  seventy-nine  years  old  the  13th 
of  December,  and  that'll  soon  be  here. 
I've  had  three  wives  in  my  time,  and  my 
third  is  still  living.  It's  a  fine  old  church, 
and  there's  figures  in  it  of  bishops,  and 
kings,  and  queens." 


THE    HAUNTS    OF    MOORE.  63 

Most  observers  have  remarked  the  odd 
way,  garrulous,  and  sometimes  uncon- 
sciously humorous,  in  which  senile  persons 
prattle  their  incongruous  and  sporadic  rec- 
ollections. But  —  "How  pregnant  some- 
times his  replies  are  !  "  Another  resident 
of  Devizes,  with  whom  I  conversed,  like- 
wise remembered  the  poet,  and  spoke  of 
him  with  affectionate  regard.  "  My  sister, 
when  she  was  a  child,"  he  said,  "was  often 
at  Moore's  house,  and  he  was  fond  of  her. 
Yes,  his  name  is  widely  remembered  and 
honoured  here.  But  I  think  that  many  of 
the  poor  people  hereabout,  the  farmers,  ad- 
mired him  chiefly  because  they  thought 
that  he  wrote  Moore's  Almanac.  They 
often  used  to  say  to  him  :  '  Mister  Moore, 
please  tell  us  what  the  weather's  gomg  to 
be.'" 

From  Devizes  to  the  village  of  Bromham, 
a  distance  of  about  four  miles,  the  walk  is 
delightful.  Much  of  the  path  is  between 
green  hedges  and  is  embowered  by  elms. 
The  exit  from  the  town  is  by  Northgate  and 
along  the  Chippenham  road  —  which,  like 
all  the  roads  in  this  neighbourhood,  is 
smooth,  hard,  and  white.  A  little  way  out 
of  Devizes,  going  northwest,  this  road 
makes  a  deep  cut  in  the  chalk-stone  and  so 


64  THE    HAUNTS    OF    MOORE. 

winds  down  hill  into  the  level  plain.  At 
intervals  you  come  upon  sweetly  pretty 
specimens  of  the  English  thatch-roof  cot- 
tage. Hay-fields,  pastures,  and  market- 
gardens  extend  on  every  hand.  Eastward, 
far  off,  are  visible  the  hills  of  Westbury, 
upon  which,  here  and  there,  the  copses 
are  lovely,  and  upon  one  of  which,  cut  in 
the  rock,  is  the  figure  of  a  colossal  white 
horse  —  said  to  have  been  put  there  by  the 
Saxons  to  commemorate  the  victories  of 
King  Alfred.  Soon  the  road  winds  over  a 
hill  and  you  pass  through  the  little  red  vil- 
lage of  Rowde,  with  its  gray  church-tower. 
The  walk  may  be  shortened  by  a  cut  across 
the  fields,  and  this  indeed  is  found  the  sweet- 
est part  of  the  journey  —  for  now  the  path 
lies  through  gardens,  and  through  the 
centre  or  along  the  margin  of  the  wheat, 
which  waves  in  the  strong  wind  and  spar- 
kles in  the  bright  sunshine  and  is  every- 
where tenderly  touched  with  the  scarlet  of 
the  poppy  and  with  hues  of  other  wild- 
flowers —  making  you  think  of  Shake- 
speare's 

"  Rank  fumiter  and  furrow  weeds, 
With   hemlock,  harlock,  nettles,  cuckoo- 
flowers, 
Darnel,  and  all  the  idle  weeds  that  grow 
In  our  sustaining  corn." 


THE    HAUNTS    OF    MOORE.  65 

There  is  one  field  through  which  I  passed, 
just  as  the  spire  of  Bromham  churcli  came 
into  view,  in  which  a  surface  more  than 
three  hundred  yards  square  was  blazing 
with  wild-flowers,  white  and  gold  and  crim- 
son and  purple  and  blue,  upon  a  growth  of 
vivid  green,  so  that  to  look  upon  it  was 
almost  to  be  dazzled,  while  the  air  that 
floated  over  it  was  scented  as  if  with  honey- 
suckle. You  may  see  the  delicate  spire  and 
the  low  gray  tower  of  Moore's  church  some 
time  before  you  come  to  it,  and  in  some 
respects  the  prospect  is  not  unlike  that  of 
Shakespeare's  church  at  Stratford.  A 
sweeter  spot  for  a  poet's  sepulchre  it  would 
be  hard  to  find.  No  spot  could  be  more 
harmonious  than  this  one  is  with  the  gen- 
tle, romantic  spirit  of  Moore's  poetry,  and 
with  the  purity,  refinement,  and  serenity 
of  his  life.  Bromham  village  consists  of  a 
few  red  brick  buildings,  scattered  along  a 
few  irregular  little  lanes,  on  a  ridge  over- 
looking a  valley.  Amid  these  humble 
homes  stands  the  gray  church,  like  a  shep- 
herd keeping  his  flock.  A  part  of  it  is  very 
old,  and  all  of  it,  richly  weather-stained 
and  delicately  browned  with  fading  moss, 
is  beautiful.  Upon  the  tower  and  along 
the  south  side  the  fantastic  gargoyles  are 

£ 


66  THE    HAUNTS   OF    MOORE. 

much  decayed.  The  building  is  a  cross. 
The  cliancel  window  faces  eastward,  and 
the  window  at  the  end  of  the  nave  looks 
toward  the  west  —  the  latter  being  a  memo- 
rial to  Moore.  At  the  southeast  corner  of 
the  building  is  the  lady  chapel,  in  which 
are  suspended  various  fragments  of  old 
armour,  and  in  the  centre  of  which,  recum- 
bent on  a  great  dark  tomb,  is  a  grim-visaged 
knight,  clad  from  top  to  toe  in  his  mail, 
beautifully  sculptured  in  marble  that  looks 
like  yellow  ivory.  Other  tombs  are  adja- 
cent, with  inscriptions  that  implicate  the 
names  of  Sir  Edward  Bayntun,  1679,  and 
Lady  Anne  Wilmot,  elder  daughter  and  co- 
heiress of  John,  Earl  of  Eochester,  who 
successively  was  the  wife  of  Henry  Bayntun 
and  Francis  Greville,  and  who  died  in  1703. 
The  window  at  the  end  of  the  nave  is  a 
simple  but  striking  composition,  in  stained 
glass,  richer  and  nobler  than  is  commonly 
seen  in  a  country  church.  It  consists  of 
twenty-one  lights,  of  which  five  are  lancet 
shafts,  side  by  side,  these  being  surmounted 
with  smaller  lancets,  forming  a  cluster  at 
the  top  of  the  arch.  In  the  centre  is  the 
figure  of  Jesus  and  around  Him  are  the 
Apostles.  The  colouring  is  soft,  true,  and 
beautiful.    Across  the  base  of  the  window 


THE    HAUNTS    OF    MOORE,  6/ 

appear  the  words,  in  the  glass:  "This 
window  is  placed  in  this  church  by  the 
combined  subscriptions  of  two  hundred 
persons  who  honour  the  memory  of  the 
poet  of  all  circles  and  the  idol  of  his  own, 
Thomas  Moore."  It  was  beneath  this  win- 
dow, in  a  little  pew  in  the  corner  of  the 
church,  that  the  present  writer  joined  in 
the  service,  and  meditated,  throughout  a 
long  sermon,  on  the  lovely  life  and  charac- 
ter and  the  gentle,  noble,  and  abiding  influ- 
ence of  the  poet  whose  hallowed  grave  and 
beloved  memory  make  this  place  a  perpetual 
shrine. 

Moore  was  buried  in  the  churchyard.  An 
iron  fence  encloses  his  tomb,  which  is  at  the 
base  of  the  church  tower,  in  an  angle  formed 
by  the  tower  and  the  chancel,  on  the  north 
side  of  the  building.  Not  more  than  twenty 
tombs  are  visible  on  this  side  of  the  church, 
and  these  appear  upon  a  level  lawn  as  green 
and  sparkling  as  an  emerald  and  as  soft  as 
velvet.  On  three  sides  the  churchyard  is 
enclosed  by  a  low  wall,  and  on  the  fourth 
by  a  dense  hedge  of  glistening  holly.  Great 
trees  are  all  around  the  church,  but  not  too 
near.  A  massive  yew  stands  dark]y  at  one 
corner.  Chestnuts  and  elms  blend  their 
branches  in  fraternal  embrace.     Close  by 


68  THE    HAUNTS    OF    MOORE. 

the  poet's  grave  a  vast  beech  uprears  its 
dome  of  fruited  boughs  and  rustling  foliage. 
The  sky  was  blue,  except  for  a  few  strag- 
gling masses  of  fleecy  and  slate-coloured 
cloud.  Not  a  human  creature  was  any- 
where to  be  seen  while  I  stood  in  this 
sacred  spot,  and  no  sound  disturbed  the 
Sabbath  stillness,  save  the  faint  whisper  of 
the  wind  in  the  lofty  tree-tops  and  the  low 
twitter  of  birds  in  their  hidden  nests.  I 
thought  of  his  long  life,  unblemished  by 
personal  guilt  or  public  error ;  of  his  sweet 
devotion  to  parents  and  wife  and  children  ; 
of  his  pure  patriotism,  which  scorned 
equally  the  blatant  fustian  of  the  dema- 
gogue and  the  frenzy  of  the  revolutionist ; 
of  his  unsurpassed  fidelity  in  friendship  ;  of 
his  simplicity  and  purity  in  a  corrupt  time 
and  amid  many  temptations  ;  of  his  meek- 
ness in  affliction  ;  of  the  devout  spirit  that 
made  him  murmur  on  his  deathbed,  "Bes- 
sie, trust  in  God"  ;  of  the  many  beautiful 
songs  that  he  added  to  our  literature, — 
every  one  of  which  is  the  perfectly  melodi- 
ous and  absolutely  final  expression  of  one 
or  another  of  the  elemental  feelings  of 
human  nature  ;  and  of  the  obligation  of 
endless  gratitude  that  the  world  owes  to 
his  fine  and  high  and  beneficent  genius. 


THE    HAUNTS    OF    MOORE.  69 

And  thus  it  seemed  good  to  be  in  this  place 
and  to  lay  with  reverent  hands  the  white 
roses  of  honour  and  affection  upon  his 
tomb. 

On  the  long,  low,  flat  stone  that  covers 
the  poet's  dust  are  mscribed  the  following 
words:  "  Anastatia  Mary  Moore.  Born 
March  16,  1813.  Died  March  8,  1829. 
Also  her  brother,  John  Russell  Moore,  who 
died  November  23,  1842,  aged  19.  years. 
Also  their  father,  Thomas  Moore,  tenderly 
beloved  by  all  who  knew  the  goodness  of 
his  heart.  The  Poet  and  Patriot  of  his 
Country,  Ireland.  Born  May  28,  1779. 
Sank  to  rest  February  25,  1852.  Aged  72. 
God  is  Love.  Also  his  wife,  Bessie  Moore, 
who  died  4th  September  1865.  And  to  the 
memory  of  their  dear  son,  Thomas  Lans- 
downe  Parr  Moore.  Born  24th  October 
1818.  Died  in  Africa,  January  1846." 
Moore's  little  daughter,  Barbara,  is  buried 
at  Hornsey,  near  London,  in  the  same 
churchyard  where  rest  the  bones  of  the  poet 
Samuel  Rogers.  On  the  stone  that  marks 
that  spot  is  written,  ' '  Anne  Jane  Barbara 
Moore.  Born  January  the  4th,  1812.  Died 
September  the  18th,  1817." 

Northwest  from  Bromham  church  and 
about  one  mile  away  stands  Sloperton  Cot- 


70  THE    HAUNTS    OF   MOORE. 

tage,  the  last  home  of  the  poet  and  the 
house  m  which  he  died.  A  deep  valley 
intervenes  between  the  church  and  the  cot- 
tage, but,  as  each  is  built  upon  a  ridge,  you 
may  readily  see  the  one  from  the  other. 
There  is  a  road  across  the  valley,  but  the 
more  pleasant  walk  is  along  a  pathway 
through  the  meadows  and  over  several 
stiles,  ending  almost  in  front  of  the  storied 
house.  It  is  an  ideal  home  for  a  poet.  The 
building  is  made  of  brick  but  it  is  so  com- 
p»etely  enwrapped  in  ivy  that  scarcely  a 
particle  of  its  surface  can  be  seen.  It  is  a 
low  building,  with  three  gables  on  its  main 
front  and  with  a  wing  ;  it  stands  in  the 
middle  of  a  garden  enclosed  by  walls  and 
by  hedges  of  ivy  ;  and  it  is  embowered  by 
great  trees,  yet  not  so  closely  embowered  as 
to  be  shorn  of  the  prospect  from  its  win- 
dows. Flowers  and  flowering  vines  were 
blooming  around  it.  The  hard,  white  road, 
lowing  past  its  gateway,  looked  like  a 
thread  of  silver  between  the  green  hedge- 
rows which  here  for  many  miles  are  rooted 
in  high,  grassy  banks,  and  at  intervals  are 
diversified  with  large  trees.  Sloperton  Cot- 
tage is  almost  alone,  but  there  are  a  few 
neighbours  and  there  is  a  little  rustic  village 
about  half  a  mile  westward.      Westward 


THE    HAUNTS    OF    MOORE.  7 1 

was  the  poet's  favourite  prospect.  He  loved 
the  sunset,  and  from  a  certain  terrace  in 
his  garden  he  rarely  failed  to  watch  the 
pageant  of  the  dying  day.  Here,  for  thirty- 
five  years,  was  his  peaceful  and  happy 
home.  Here  he  meditated  many  of  those 
gems  of  lyrical  poetry  that  will  live  in  the 
hearts  of  men  as  long  as  anythmg  lives  that 
ever  was  written  by  mortal  hand.  And  here 
he  "  sank  to  rest,"  worn  out  at  last  by  in- 
cessant labour  and  by  many  sorrows — the 
bitter  fruit  of  domestic  bereavement  and 
disappointment.  The  sun  was  sinking  as  I 
turned  away  from  this  hallowed  haunt  of 
genius  and  virtue,  and,  through  green  pas- 
tures and  flower-spangled  fields  of  waving 
gram,  set  forth  upon  my  homeward  walk. 
Soon  there  was  a  lovely  peal  of  chimes 
from  Bromham  church  tower,  answered  far 
off  by  the  bells  of  Rowde,  and,  while  I  de- 
scended into  the  darkening  valley,  Moore's 
tender  words  came  singing  through  my 
thought : — 

**  And  so  'twill  be  when  I  am  gone  — 
That  tuneful  peal  will  still  ring  on, 
"While  other  bards  shall  walk  these  dells 
And  sing  your  praise,  sweet  evening  bells  !  " 


72  BEAUTIFUL    BATH. 


V. 

BEAUTIFUL   BATH. 

FROM  Devizes  the  traveller  naturally 
turns  toward  Bath,  which  is  only  a 
few  miles  distant.  A  beautiful  city,  marred 
somewhat  by  the  feverish,  disturbing  spirit 
of  the  present  day,  this  old  place — in 
which  the  Saxon  King  Edgar  was  crowned, 
A.D,  973  —  nevertheless  retains  many  inter- 
esting characteristics  of  its  former  glory. 
More  than  a  century  has  passed  since  the 
wigged,  powdered,  and  jewelled  days  of 
Beau  Nash.  The  Avon  (for  there  is  another 
Avon  here,  distinct  from  that  of  Warwick- 
shire and  that  of  Yorkshire)  is  spanned  by 
bridges  that  Smollett  never  dreamed  of  and 
Sheridan  never  saw.  The  town  has  crept 
upward,  along  both  the  valley  slopes,  nearer 
and  nearer  to  the  hill-tops  that  used  to  look 
down  upon  it.  Along  the  margins  of  the 
river  many  gray,  stone  structures  are 
mouldering  in  neglect  and  decay  ;  but  a 
tramcar  rattles  through  the  principal  street ; 


V 

uJ 

m 

CD 

<r 


BEAUTIFUL    BATH.  73 

the  bootblack  and  the  newsvender  are 
active  and  vociferous  ;  the  causeways  are 
crowded  with  a  bustling  throng,  and  carts 
and  carriages  dash  and  scramble  over  the 
pavement,  while,  where  of  old  the  horn 
used  to  sound  a  gay  flourish  and  the  coach 
to  come  spinning  in  from  London,  now  is 
heard  the  shriek  and  clangour  of  the  steam- 
engine  dashing  down  the  vale  with  morn- 
ing papers  and  with  passengers,  three  hours 
from  town.  This,  indeed,  is  not  "the 
season"  (August  21,  1888),  and  of  late  it 
has  rained  with  zealous  persistence,  so  that 
Bath  is  not  in  her  splendour.  Much  how- 
ever can  be  seen,  and  the  essential  fact 
that  she  is  no  longer  the  Gainsborough 
belle  that  she  used  to  be  is  distinctly  evident. 
You  must  yield  your  mind  to  fancy  if  you 
would  conjure  up,  while  walking  in  these 
modern  streets,  the  gay  and  quaint  things 
described  in  Hum][>hrey  Clinker  or  indicated 
in  The  Rivals.  The  Bath  chairs,  some- 
times pulled  by  donkeys,  and  sometimes 
trundled  by  men,  are  among  the  most  rep- 
resentative relics  now  to  be  seen.  Next  to 
the  theatre  (where  it  was  my  privilege  to 
enjoy  and  admire  John  L.  Toole's  richly 
humorous  performance  of  The  Don)  stands 
a  building,  just  at  the  foot  of   Gascoigne 


74  BEAUTIFUL    BATH. 

Place,  before  wliicli  the  traveller  pauses 
with  interest,  because  upon  its  front  he 
may  read  the  legend,  neatly  engraved  on  a 
white  marble  slab,  that  ' '  In  this  house 
lived  the  celebrated  Beau  Nash,  and  here 
he  died,  February  1761."  It  is  an  odd 
structure,  consisting  of  two  stories  and  an 
attic,  the  front  being  of  the  monotonous 
stucco  that  came  in  with  the  Regent. 
Earlier  no  doubt  the  building  was  timbered. 
There  are  eleven  windows  in  the  front,  four 
of  them  being  painted  on  the  wall.  The 
house  is  used  now  by  an  auctioneer.  In 
the  historic  Pump  Room  —  dating  back  to 
1797 — raised  aloft  in  an  alcove  at  the  east 
end,  still  stands  the  effigy  of  the  Beau,  even 
as  it  stood  in  the  days  when  he  set  the 
fashions,  regulated  the  customs,  and  gave 
the  laws,  and  was  the  King  of  Bath  ;  but 
the  busts  of  Newton  and  Pope  that  formerly 
stood  on  either  side  of  this  statue  stand 
there  no  more  —  save  in  the  fancy  of  those 
who  recall  the  epigram  which  was  sug- 
gested by  that  singular  group  :  — 

"This  statue  placed  these  busts  between 
Gives  satire  all  its  strength  ; 
Wisdom  and  Wit  are  little  seen. 
But  Folly  at  full  length." 

Folly,  though,  is  a  word  that  carries  a 


BEAUTIFUL    BATH.  75 

different  meaning  to  different  ears.  Doug- 
las Jerrold  made  a  play  on  the  subject  of 
3eau  Nash  —  an  ingenious,  effective,  bril- 
liantly written  play,  in  which  he  is  depicted 
as  anything  but  foolish.  Much  always  de- 
pends on  the  point  of  view. 

Quin  was  buried  in  Bath  Abbey,  and 
Bath  is  the  scene  of  The  Rivals.  It  would 
be  pleasant  to  fancy  the  trim  figure  of  the 
truculent  Sir  Lucius  O' Trigger  strutting 
along  the  Parade  ;  or  bluff  and  choleric  Sir 
Anthony  Absolute  gazing  with  imperious 
condescension  upon  the  galaxy  of  the  Pump 
Room  ;  Acres  in  his  absurd  finery  ;  Lydia 
with  her  sentimental  novels ;  and  Mrs. 
Malaprop,  rigid  with  decorum,  in  her  Bath 
chair.  The  Abbey,  begun  in  1405  and  com- 
pleted in  1606,  has  a  noble  west  front  and 
a  magnificent  door  of  carved  oak,  and  cer- 
tainly it  is  a  superb  church ;  but  the  eyes 
that  have  rested  upon  such  cathedrals  as 
those  of  Durham,  Edinburgh,  and  Glasgow, 
such  a  heavenly  jewel  as  Roslin,  and  such 
an  astounding  and  overwhelming  edifice  as 
York  minster,  can  dwell  calmly  on  Bath 
Abbey,  A  surprising  feature  in  it  is  its 
mural  record  of  the  dead  that  are  entombed 
beneath-  or  around  it.  Sir  Lucius  might 
well  declare  that  "  There  is  snug  lying  in 


76  BEAUTIFUL    BATH, 

the  Abbey."  Almost  every  foot  of  the  walls 
is  covered  with  monumental  slabs,  and  like 
Captain  Cuttle,  after  the  wedding  of  Mr. 
Dombey  and  Edith  Granger,  I  "pervaded 
the  church  and  read  the  epitaphs,"  —  solic- 
itous to  discover  that  of  the  renowned  actor 
James  Quin.  His  tablet  was  formerly  to 
be  found  in  the  chancel,  but  now  it  is 
obscurely  placed  in  a  porch,  on  the  north 
corner  of  the  building,  on  what  may  be 
termed  the  outer  wall  of  the  sanctuary.  It 
presents  the  face  of  the  famous  comedian 
carved  in  white  marble  and  set  against  a 
black  slab.  Beneath  is  the  date  of  his 
death,  "Ob.  mdcclxvi.  Aetat  lxxiii.," 
and  his  epitaph,  written  by  David  Garrick. 
At  the  base  are  dramatic  emblems  —  the 
mask  and  the  dagger.  As  a  portrait  this 
medallion  of  Quin  bears  internal  evidence 
of  scrupulous  fidelity  to  nature,  and  cer- 
tainly it  is  a  fine  work  of  art.  The  head  is 
dressed  as  it  was  in  life,  with  the  full  wig 
of  the  period.  The  features  are  delicately 
cut  and  are  indicative  of  austere  beauty  of 
countenance  —  impressive  if  not  attractive. 
The  mouth  is  especially  handsome  —  the 
upper  lip  being  a  perfect  Cupid's  bow. 
The  face  is  serious,  expressive,  and  fraught 
with  intellect  and  power.     This  was  the 


BEAUTIFUL    BATH.  TJ 

last  great  declaimer  of  the  old  school  of 
acting,  discomfited  and  almost  obliterated 
by  Garrick  ;  and  here  are  the  words  that 
Garrick  wrote  upon  his  tomb  :  — 

"  That  tongue  which  set  the  table  on  a  roar ' 
And  charmed  the  public  ear  is  heard  no 

more; 
Closed  are  those  eyes,  the  harbingers  of  wit, 
Which    spoke,    before     the    tongue,    what 

Shakespeare  writ ; 
Cold    is    that    hand    which,    living,    was 

stretched  forth, 
At    friendship's    call,    to    succour    modest 

worth. 
Here  lies  JAIVIES  QUIN.    Deign,  reader,  to 

be  taught 
Whate'er  thy  strength    of    body,   force  of 

thought. 
In  nature's  happiest  mould  however  cast. 
To  this  complexion  thou  must  come  at  last." 

A  printed  reminder  of  mortality  is  super- 
fluous in  Bath,  for  you  almost  continually 
behold  afflicted  and  deformed  persons  who 
have  come  here  to  ' '  take  the  waters. ' '  For 
rheumatic  sufferers  this  place  is  a  paradise 
—  as,  indeed,  it  is  for  all  wealthy  persons 
who  love  luxury.  Walter  Savage  Landor 
said  that  the  only  two  cities  of  Europe  in 
which  he  could  live  were  Bath  and  Florence  ; 
but  that  was  long  ago.     When  you  have 


78  BEALTIFTTL    BATH. 

walked  in  Milsom  street  and  Lansdowne 
Crescent,  sailed  upon  the  Avon,  observed 
the  Abbey,  without  and  within — for  its 
dusky,  weather-stained  walls  are  extremely 
picturesque  —  attended  the  theatre,  climbed 
the  hills  for  the  view  of  the  city  and  the 
Avon  valley,  and  taken  the  baths,  you  will 
have  had  a  satisfying  experience  of  Bath. 
The  greatest  luxury  in  the  place  is  a  swim- 
ming tank  of  mmeral  water,  about  forty 
feet  long,  by  twenty  broad,  and  five  feet 
deep  —  a  tepid  pool  of  most  refreshing 
potency.  And  the  chief  curiosity  is  the 
ruin  of  a  Roman  bath  which  was  discovered 
and  laid  bare  in  1885.  This  is  built  in  the 
form  of  a  rectangular  basin  of  stone,  with 
steps  around  it,  and  it  was  environed  with 
stone  chambers  that  were  used  as  dressing- 
rooms.  The  basin  is  nearly  perfect.  The 
work  of  restoration  of  this  ancient  bath  is 
in  progress,  but  the  relic  will  be  preserved 
only  as  an  emblem  of  the  past. 

Haynes  Bayly,  the  song-writer,  was  bom 
in  Bath,  and  there  he  melodiously  recorded 
that  "  She  wore  a  wreath  of  roses,"  and 
there  he  dreamed  of  dwelling  "  in  marble 
halls."  But  Bath  is  not  nearly  as  rich  in 
literary  associations  as  its  neighbour  city 
of  Bristol.  Chatterton,  Southey,  Hannah 
More,    Mary   Robinson — the   actress,  the 


BEAUTIFUL   BATH.  79 

lovely  and  unfortunate  "Perdita,"  —  all 
these  were  born  in  Bristol.  Richard  Savage, 
the  poet,  died  there  (1743),  and  so  did  John 
Hippesley,  the  comedian,  manager,  and 
farce-writer  (1748).  St.  Mary  Redclyffe 
church,  built  in  1292,  is  still  standing  there, 
of  which  Chatterton's  father  was  the  sexton, . 
and  in  the  tower  of  which  "the  marvel- 
lous boy"  discovered,  according  to  his  in- 
genious plan  of  literary  imposture,  the 
original  Canynge  and  Rowley  manuscripts. 
That  famous  preacher,  the  Rev.  Robert 
Hall  (1764-1831),  had  a  church  in  Bristol. 
Southey  and  Coleridge  married  sisters,  of 
the  name  of  Fricker,  who  resided  there,  and 
the  house  once  occupied  by  Coleridge  is  still 
extant  in  the  contiguous  village  of  Clevedon 
—  one  of  the  loveliest  places  on  the  English 
coast.  Jane  Porter  and  Anna  Maria  Porter 
lived  in  Bristol,  and  Maria  died  at  Mont- 
pelier  near  by.  These  notes  indicate  but  a 
tithe  of  what  may  be  seen  and  studied  and 
enjoyed  in  and  about  Bristol,  —  the  city  to 
which  poor  Chatterton  left  his  curse  ;  the 
region  hallowed  by  the  dust  of  Arthur 
Hallam  —  the  inspiration  of  Tennyson's 
In  Memoriam.,  the  loftiest  poem  that  has 
been  created  in  the  English  language  since 
the  pen  that  wrote  Childe  Harold  fell  from 
the  divine  hand  of  Byron. 


8o         THE   LAND    OF    WORDSWORTH. 


VI. 

THE    LAND   OF   WORDSWORTH. 

A  GOOD  way  by  which  to  enter  the  Lake 
District  of  England  is  to  travel  to 
Penrith  and  thence  to  drive  along  the  shore 
of  Ullswater J  or  sail  upon  its  crystal  bosom, 
to  the  blooming  solitude  of  Patterdale. 
Penrith  lies  at  the  eastern  slope  of  the 
mountains  of  Westmoreland,  and  you  may 
there  see  the  ruins  of  Penrith  Castle,  once 
the  property  and  the  abode  of  Kichard, 
Duke  of  Gloucester,  before  he  became  King 
of  England.  Penrith  Castle  was  one  of  the 
estates  that  were  forfeited  by  the  great  Earl 
of  Warwick,  and  King  Edward  IV.  gave  it 
to  his  brother  Eichard  in  1471.  Not  much 
remains  of  this  ancient  structure,  and  the 
remnant  is  now  occupied  by  a  florist.  I  saw 
it,  as  I  saw  almost  everything  else  m  Great 
Britain  during  the  summer  of  1888,  under  a 
tempest  of  rain  ;  for  it  rained  there,  with  a 
continuity  almost  ruinous,  from  the  time  of 
the  lilac  and  aDple-blossom  till  when  the 


THE    LAND    OF    WORDSWOKTH.         8 1 

clematis  began  to  show  the  splendour  of  its 
purple  shield  and  the  acacia  to  drop  its 
milky  blossoms  on  the  autumnal  grass. 
But  travellers  must  not  heed  the  weather. 
If  there  are  dark  days  there  are  also  bright 
ones  —  and  one  bright  day  in  such  a  para- 
dise as  the  English  Lakes  atones  for  the 
dreariness  of  a  month  of  rain.  Beside,  even 
the  darkest  days  may  be  brightened  by 
gentle  companionship.  Henry  Irving  and 
Ernest  Bendall,  two  of  the  most  intellectual 
and  genial  men  in  England,  were  my  asso- 
ciates in  that  expedition.  We  went  from 
London  into  Westmoreland  on  a  mild,  sweet 
day  in  July,  and  we  rambled  for  several 
days  in  that  enchanted  region.  It  was  a 
delicious  experience  ;  and  I  often  close  my 
eyes  and  dream  of  it  —  as  I  am  dreaming 
now. 

In  the  drive  between  Penrith  and  Patter- 
dale  you  see  many  things  that  are  worthy 
of  regard.  Among  these  are  the  parish 
church  of  Penrith,  a  building  made  of  red 
stone,  remarkable  for  a  massive  square 
tower  of  great  age  and  formidable  aspect. 
In  the  adjacent  churchyard  are  "The  Gi- 
ant's Grave"  and  "The  Giant's  Thumb," 
relics  of  a  distant  past  that  strongly  and 
strangely  affect  the  imagination.    The  grave 


82  THE    LAND    OF   WORDSWORTH. 

is  said  to  be  that  of  Owen  Csesarius,  a  gigan- 
tic individual  who  reigned  over  Cumberland 
in  remote  Saxon  times.  The  Thumb  is  a 
rough  stone,  about  seven  feet  high,  pre- 
senting a  clumsy  cross,  and  doubtless  com- 
memorative of  another  mighty  warrior.  Sir 
Walter  Scott,  who  traversed  Penrith  on  his 
journeys  between  Edinburgh  and  London, 
seldom  omitted  to  pause  for  a  view  of  those 
singular  memorials  —  and  Scott,  like  Words- 
worth, has  left  upon  this  region  the  abiding 
impress  of  his  splendid  genius.  "  Ulfo's 
Lake  "  is  Scott's  name  for  Ullswater,  and 
thereabout  is  laid  the  scene  of  his  poem  of 
The  Bridal  of  Triermain.  In  Scott's  day 
the  traveller  went  by  coach  or  on  horseback, 
but  now,  "On  lonely  Threlkeld's  solemn 
waste,"  at  the  foot  of  craggy  Blencathara, 
you  pause  at  a  railway  station  having 
"Threlkeld"  in  large  letters  on  its  official 
signboard.  Another  strange  thing  that  is 
passed  on  the  road  between  Penrith  and 
Patterdale  is  "Arthur's  Kound  Table"  — 
a  circle  of  turf  slightly  raised  above  the 
surrounding  level,  and  certainly  remarka- 
ble, whatever  may  be  its  historic  or  anti- 
quarian merit,  for  fine  texture,  symmetrical 
form,  and  lovely,  luxuriant  colour.  Scholars 
think  it  was  used  for  tournaments  in  the 


THE   LAND    OF  WORDSWORTH.  b^ 

days  of  chivalry,  but  no  one  rightly  knows 
anything  about  it,  save  that  it  is  old.  Not 
far  from  this  bit  of  mysterious  antiquity  the 
road  winds  through  a  quaint  village  called 
Tirril,  where,  in  the  Quaker  burial-ground, 
is  the  grave  of  an  unfortunate  young  man, 
Charles  Gough,  who  lost  his  life  by  falling 
from  the  Striding  Edge  of  Helvellyn  in  1805, 
and  whose  memory  is  hallowed  by  Words- 
worth and  Scott,  in  poems  that  almost  every 
schoolboy  has  read,  and  could  never  forget 
—  associated  as  they  are  with  the  story  of 
the  faithful  dog  for  three  months  in  that 
lonesome  wilderness  vigilant  beside  the  dead 
body  of  his  master, 

"  A  lofty  precipice  in  front, 
A  silent  tarn  below." 

Patterdale  possesses  this  advantage  over 
certain  other  towns  and  hamlets  of  the  lake 
region  —  that  it  is  not  much  frequented  by 
tourists.  The  coach  does  indeed  roll  through 
it  at  intervals,  laden  with  those  miscellane- 
ous, desultory  visitors  whose  pleasure  it  is 
to  rush  wildly  over  the  land.  And  those 
objects  serve  to  remind  you  that  now,  even 
as  in  Wordsworth's  time,  and  in  a  double 
sense,  "the  world  is  too  much  with  us." 
But  an  old-fashioned   inn  (Kidd's   hotel) 


84         THE   LAND    OF   WORDSWORTH. 

Still  exists  at  the  head  of  Ullswater,  to 
which  fashion  has  not  resorted  and  where 
kindness  presides  over  the  traveller's  com- 
fort. Close  by  also  is  a  sweet  nook  called 
Glenridding,  where,  if  you  are  a  lover  of 
solitude  and  peace,  you  may  find  an  ideal 
abode.  One  house  wherein  lodging  may  be 
obtained  was  literally  embowered  in  roses 
on  that  summer  evening  when  first  I  strolled 
by  the  fragrant  hay -fields  on  the  Patterdale 
shore  of  Ullswater.  The  rose  flourishes 
in  wonderful  luxuriance  and  profusion 
throughout  Westmoreland  and  Cumber- 
land. As  you  drive  along  the  lonely  roads 
your  way  will  sometimes  be,  for  many  miles, 
between  hedges  that  are  bespangled  with 
wild  roses  and  with  the  silver  globes  of  the 
laurel  blossom,  while  all  around  you  the 
lonely  mountains,  bare  of  foliage  save  for 
matted  grass  and  a  dense  growth  of  low 
ferns,  tower  to  meet  the  clouds.  It  is  a 
wild  place,  and  yet  there  is  a  pervading 
spirit  of  refinement  over  it  all  —  as  if  Nature 
had  here  wrought  her  wonders  in  the  mood 
of  the  finest  art.  And  at  the  same  time  it 
is  a  place  of  infinite  variety.  The  whole 
territory  occupied  by  the  lakes  and  moun- 
tains of  this  famous  district  is  not  more 
than  fifty  miles   square ;   yet  within  this 


THE    LAND    OF    WORDSWORTH.  85 

limit,  comparatively  narrow,  are  comprised 
all  possible  beauties  of  land  and  water  that 
the  most  passionate  devotee  of  natural 
loveliness  could  desire. 

My  first  night  in  Patterdale  was  one  of 
such  tempest  as  sometimes  rages  in  Amer- 
ica about  the  time  of  the  fall  equinox.  The 
wind  shook  the  building.  It  was  long  after 
midnight  when  I  went  to  rest,  and  the 
storm  seemed  to  increase  in  fury  as  the 
night  wore  on.  Torrents  of  rain  were 
dashed  against  the  windows.  Great  trees 
near  by  creaked  and  groaned  beneath  the 
strength  of  the  gale.  The  cold  was  so  se- 
vere that  blankets  were  welcome.  It  was 
my  first  night  in  Wordsworth's  country, 
and  I  thought  of  Wordsworth's  lines  :  — 

**  There  was  a  roaring  in  the  wind  all  night; 
The  rain  came  heavily  and  fell  in  floods." 

The  next  morning  was  sweet  with  sunshine 
and  gay  with  birds  and  flowers,  and  all 
semblance  of  storm  and  trouble  seemed 
banished  forever. 

"  But  now  the  sun  is  shining  calm  and  bright, 
And  birds  are  singing  in  the  distant  woods." 

Wordsworth's  poetry  expresses  the  in- 
most soul  of  those  lovely  lakes  and  mighty 
hills,  and  no  writer  can  hope  to  tread,  save 


86  THE    LAND    OF    WORDSWORTH. 

remotely  and  with  reverent  humility,  in  the 
footsteps  of  that  magician.  You  under- 
stand Wordsworth  better,  however,  and 
you  love  him  more  dearly,  for  having  ram- 
bled over  his  consecrated  ground.  There 
was  not  a  day  when  I  did  not,  in  some 
shape  or  another,  meet  with  his  presence. 
Whenever  I  was  alone  his  influence  came 
upon  me  as  something  unspeakably  majes- 
tic and  solemn.  Once,  on  a  Sunday  after- 
noon, I  climbed  to  the  topmost  height  of 
Place  Fell  (which  is  2154  feet  above  the  sea- 
level,  while  Scawfell  Pike  is  3210,  and  Hel- 
vellyn  is  3118),  and  there,  in  the  short  space 
of  two  hours,  I  was  thrice  cut  off  by  rain- 
storms from  all  view  of  the  world  beneath. 
Not  a  tree  could  I  find  on  that  mountain- 
top,  nor  any  place  of  shelter  from  the  blast 
and  the  rain  —  except  when  crouching  be- 
side the  mound  of  rock  at  its  summit,  which 
in  that  country  they  call  a  "  man."  Not  a 
living  creature  was  visible,  save  now  and 
then  a  lonely  sheep,  who  stared  at  me  for  a 
moment  and  then  scurried  away.  But  when 
the  skies  cleared  and  the  cloudy  squadrons 
of  the  storm  went  careering  over  Helvellyn, 
I  looked  down  into  no  less  than  fifteen  val- 
leys beavitifully  coloured  by  the  foliage  and 
the  patches  of  cultivated  land,   each  vale 


THE    LAND    OF    WORDSWORTH.  87 

being  sparsely  fringed  with  little  gray  stone 
dwellings  that  seemed  no  more  than  card- 
houses,  in  those  appalling  depths.  You 
think  of  Wordsworth  in  such  a  place  as 
that — if  you  know  his  poetry.  You  cannot 
choose  hut  think  of  him. 

"  Who  comes  not  hither  ne'er  shall  know 
How  beautiful  the  world  below." 

Yet  somehow  it  happened  that  whenever 
friends  joined  in  those  rambles  the  great 
poet  was  sure  to  dawn  upon  us  in  a  comic 
way.  When  we  were  resting  on  the  bridge 
at  the  foot  of  "Brothers  Water,"  which  is 
a  little  lake,  scarcely  more  than  a  mountain 
tarn,  lying  between  Ullswater  and  the  Kirk- 
stone  Pass,  some  one  recalled  that  Words- 
worth had  once  rested  there  and  written  a 
poem  about  it.  We  were  not  all  as  devout 
admirers  of  the  bard  as  I  am,  and  certainly 
it  is  not  every  one  of  the  great  author's 
compositions  that  a  lover  of  his  genius 
would  wish  to  hear  quoted  under  such  cir- 
cumstances. The  Brothers  Water  poem  is 
the  one  that  begins  "The  cock  is  crowing, 
the  stream  is  flowing,"  and  I  do  not  think 
that  .its  insipidity  is  much  relieved  by  its 
famous  picture  of  the  grazing  cattle,  "  forty 
feeding  like  one."    Henry  Irving,  not  much 


65  THE    LAND   OF    WORDSWORTH. 

given  to  enthusiasm  about  Wordsworth, 
heard  those  lines  with  undisguised  merri- 
ment, and  made  a  capital  travesty  of  them 
on  the  spot.  It  is  sigiiificant  to  remember, 
with  reference  to  the  inequality  of  Words- 
worth, that  on  the  day  before  he  wrote 
"  The  cock  is  crowing,"  and  at  a  place  but 
a  short  distance  from  the  Brothers  Water 
bridge,  he  had  written  that  peerless  lyric 
about  the  daffodils  —  "I  wandered  lonely 
as  a  cloud. ' '  Gowbarrow  Park  is  the  scene 
of  that  poem  —  a  place  of  ferns  and  haw- 
thorns, notable  for  containing  Lyulph's 
Tower,  a  romantic,  ivy-clad  lodge  owned 
by  the  Duke  of  Norfolk,  and  Aira  Force,  a 
waterfall  much  finer  than  Lodore.  Upon 
the  lake  shore  in  Gowbarrow  Park  you  may 
still  see  the  daffodils  as  Wordsworth  saw 
them,  a  golden  host,  ' '  glittering  and  danc- 
ing in  the  breeze."  No  one  but  a  true  poet 
could  have  made  that  perfect  lyric,  with  its 
delicious  close :  — 

"  For  oft,  when  on  my  couch  I  lie 

In  vacant  or  in  pensive  mood, 

They  flash  upon  that  inward  eye 

Which  is  the  bliss  of  solitude : 

And  then  my  heart  with  pleasure  fills, 

And  dances  with  the  daffodils." 

The  third  and  fourth  lines  were  written 


THE    LAND    OF   WORDSWORTH.  89 

by  the  poet's  wife  —  and  they  show  that 
she  was  not  a  poet's  wife  in  vain.  It  must 
have  been  in  his  "vacant  mood"  that  he 
rested  and  wrote  on  the  bridge  at  Brothers 
Water.  "  I  saw  Wordsworth  often  wlien  I 
was  a  child,"  Frank  MarslialH  said  (who 
had  joined  us  at  Penrith);  "he  used  to 
come  to  my  father's  house,  Patterdale  Hall, 
and  once  I  was  sent  to  the  garden  by  Mrs. 
Wordsworth  to  call  him  to  supper.  He  was 
musing  there,  I  suppose.  He  had  a  long, 
horse-like  face.  I  don't  think  I  liked  him. 
I  said,  '  Your  wife  wants  you.'  He  looked 
down  at  me  and  he  answered,  '  My  boy, 
you  should  say  Mrs.  Wordsworth,  and  not 
"your  wife."  '  I  looked  up  at  him  and  I 
replied,  '  She  is  your  wife,  isn't  she  ? ' 
Whereupon  he  said  no  more.  I  don't  think 
he  liked  me  either."  We  were  going  up 
Kirkstone  Pass  when  Marshall  told  this 
story  —  which  seemed  to  bring  the  pensive 
and  homely  poet  plamly  before  us.  An 
hour  later  at  the  top  of  the  pass,  while 
waiting  in  the  old  inn  called  the  Travel- 
lers' Rest,  which  incorrectly  proclaims  it- 

1  F.  A.  Marshall,  editor  of  The  Henry  Irving  edi- 
tion of  Shakespeare  and  author  of  A  Study  of 
Hamlet,  the  comedy  of  False  Shame,  and  many 
other  works,  died  in  London,  December,  1889,  much 
lamented. 


90  THE    LAND    OF    WORDSWORTH. 

self  the  highest  inhabited  house  in  England 
[it  is  1481  feet  above  the  sea-level,  whereas 
the  inn  called  The  Cat  and  Fiddle, —  a 
corruption  of  Caton  le  Fidele,  governor  of 
Calais,  —  on  Axe  Edge,  near  Buxton,  is 
1700  feet  above  the  level  of  the  sea],  I 
spoke  with  an  ancient,  weather-beaten  hos- 
tler, not  wholly  unfamiliar  with  the  medici- 
nal virtue  of  ardent  spirits,  and  asked  for 
his  opinion  of  the  great  lake  poet.  They 
all  know  him  in  that  region.  "Well,"  he 
said,  "people  are  always  talking  about 
Wordsworth,  but  I  don't  see  much  in  it. 
I've  read  it,  but  I  don't  care  for  it.  It's 
dry  stuff  —  it  don't  chime."  Truly  there 
are  all  sorts  of  views,  just  as  there  are  all 
sorts  of  people. 

Mementos  of  Wordsworth  are  frequently 
encountered  by  the  traveller  among  these 
lakes  and  fells.  One  of  these,  situated  at 
the  foot  of  Place  Fell,  is  a  rustic  cottage 
that  the  poet  once  selected  for  his  residence, 
and  partly  purchased.  It  somewhat  re- 
sembles the  Shakespeare  cottage  at  Strat- 
ford—  the  living-room  being  floored  with 
stone  slabs,  irregular  in  size  and  shape  and 
mostly  broken  by  hard  use.  In  a  corner  of 
the  kitchen  stands  a  fine  carved  oak  cup- 
board, dark  with  age,  inscribed  with  the 
date  of  the  Merry  Monarch,  1660. 


THE    LAND    OF    WORDSWORTH.  9I 

What  were  the  sights  of  those  sweet  days 
that  linger  still,  and  will  always  linger,  in 
my  remembrance  ?  A  ramble  in  the  old 
park  of  Patterdale  Hall,  which  is  full  of 
American  trees  ;  a  golden  morning  in  Dove- 
dale,  with  Henry  Irving,  much  like  Jaques, 
reclined  upon  a  shaded  rock,  half-way  up 
the  mountain,  musing  and  moralising  in 
his  sweet,  kind  way,  beside  the  brawling 
stream;  the  first  prospect  of  Windermere, 
from  above  Ambleside  —  a  vision  of  heaven 
upon  earth  ;  the  drive  by  Kydal  Water, 
which  has  all  the  loveliness  of  celestial  pic- 
tures seen  in  dreams  ;  the  glimpse  of  stately 
Rydal  Hall  and  of  the  sequestered  Rydal 
Mount,  where  Wordsworth  so  long  lived 
and  where  he  died ;  the  Wishing  Gate, 
where  one  of  us,  I  know,  wished  in  his 
heart  that  he  could  be  young  again  and  be 
wiser  than  to  waste  his  youth  in  self-willed 
folly  ;  the  restful  hours  of  observation  and 
thought  at  delicious  Grasmere,  where  we 
stood  in  silence  at  Wordsworth's  grave  and 
heard  the  murmur  of  Rotha  singing  at  his 
feet ;  the  lovely  drive  past  Matterdale, 
across  the  moorlands,  with  only  clouds  and 
rooks  for  our  chance  companions,  and 
mountains  for  sentinels  along  our  way  ;  the 
ramble  through  Keswick,   all  golden   and 


92  THE    LAND    OF    WORDSWORTH. 

glowing  in  the  afternoon  sun,  till  we  stood 
by  Crosthwaite  church  and  read  the  words 
of  commemoration  that  grace  the  tomb  of 
Robert  Soutliey  ;  the  divine  circuit  of  Der- 
went  —  surely  the  loveliest  sheet  of  water 
in  England  ;  the  descent  into  the  vale  of 
Keswick,  with  sunset  on  the  rippling 
crystal  of  the  lake  and  the  perfume  of 
countless  wild  roses  on  the  evening  whid. 
These  things,  and  the  midnight  talk  about 
these  things  —  Irving,  so  tranquil,  so  gen- 
tle, so  full  of  keen  and  sweet  apprecia- 
tion of  them  —  Bendall,  so  bright  and 
thoughtful  —  Marshall,  so  quaint  and  jolly, 
and  so  full  of  knowledge  equally  of  nature 
and  of  books  !  —  can  never  be  forgotten. 
In  one  heart  they  are  cherished  forever. 

Wordsworth  is  buried  in  Grasmere  church- 
yard, close  by  the  wall,  on  the  bank  of  the 
little  river  Rotha.  "Sing  him  thy  best," 
said  Matthew  Arnold,  in  his  lovely  dirge 
for  the  great  poet  — 

"  Sing  him  thy  best !  for  few  or  none 
Hears  thy  voice  right,  now  he  is  gone." 

In  the  same  grave  with  Wordsworth 
sleeps  his  devoted  wife.  Beside  them  rest 
the  poet's  no  less  devoted  sister  Dorothy 
(who  died  at  Rydal  Mount  in  1855,  aged 


THE    LAND    OF    WORDSWORTH.  93 

83),  and  his  favourite  daughter,  Dora, 
together  with  her  husband,  Edward  Quilli- 
nan,  of  whom  Arnold  wrote  so  tenderly :  — 

"  Alive,  we  would  have  changed  his  lot, 
We  would  not  change  it  now." 

On  the  low  gravestone  that  marks  the 
sepulchre  of  Wordsworth  are  written  these 
words  :  "  William  Wordsworth,  1850.  Mary 
Wordsworth,  1859."  In  the  neighbouring 
church  a  marble  tablet  on  the  wall  presents 
this  inscription :  — 

"  To  the  memory  of  William  Wordsworth. 
A  true  poet  and  philosopher,  who  by  the 
special  gift  and  calling  of  Almighty  God, 
whether  he  discoursed  on  man  or  nature, 
failed  not  to  lift  up  the  heart  to  holy  things, 
tired  not  of  maintaining  the  cause  of  the  poor 
and  simple,  and  so  in  perilous  times  was  raised 
up  to  be  a  chief  minister,  not  only  of  noblest 
poetry,  but  of  high  and  sacred  truth.  The 
memorial  is  raised  here  by  his  friends  and 
neighbours,  in  testimony  of  respect,  affection, 
and  gratitude.    Anno  mdcccli." 

A  few  steps  from  this  memorable  group 
will  bring  you  to  the  marble  cross  that 
marks  the  resting-place  of  Hartley  Cole- 
ridge, son  of  the  great  author  of  The  An- 
cient Mariner^  himself  a  poet  of  exquisite 
genius ;  and  close  by  is  a  touching  memo- 


94  THE   LAND    OF   WORDSWORTH. 

rial  to  the  gifted  man  wlio  inspired  Mattliew 
Arnold's  poems  of  The  Scholar- Gipsy  and 
Thyrsis.  This  is  a  slab  laid  upon  his 
mother's  grave,  at  the  foot  of  her  own  tomb- 
stone, inscribed  with  these  words  :  — 

"  In  memory  of  Arthur  Hugh  Clough,  some 
time  Fellow  of  Oriel  College,  Oxford,  the  be- 
loved son  of  James  Butler  and  Anne  Clough. 
This  remembrance  in  his  own  country  is  placed 
on  his  mother's  grave  by  those  to  whom  life 
was  made  happy  by  his  presence  and  his  love. 
He  is  buried  in  the  Swiss  cemetery  at  Florence, 
where  he  died,  November  13,  1861,  aged  42. 

* ' '  So,  dearest,  now  thy  brows  are  cold 
I  see  thee  what  thou  art,  and  know 
Thy  likeness  to  the  wise  below, 
Thy  kindred  with  the  great  of  old.'  " 

Southey  rests  in  Crosthwaite  churchyard, 
about  half  a  mile  north  of  Keswick,  where 
he  died.  They  show  you  Greta  Hall,  a  fine 
mansion  on  a  little  hill  enclosed  in  tall  trees, 
which  for  forty  years,  ending  in  1843,  was 
the  poet's  home.  In  the  church  is  a  marble 
figure  of  Southey,  recumbent  on  a  large  stone 
sarcophagus,  which  does  no  justice  to  his 
great  personal  beauty.  His  grave  is  in  the 
ground,  a  little  way  from  the  church,  marked 
by  a  low  flat  tomb,  on  the  end  of  which 


THE    LAND    OF    WOKDSWOKTll.  95 

appears  an  inscription  commemorative  of 
an  old  servant  who  had  lived  fifty  years  in 
his  family  and  is  buried  with  him.  There 
was  a  pretty  scene  at  this  grave.  When 
I  came  near  it  Irving  was  already  there, 
and  was  speaking  to  a  little  girl  who  had 
guided  him  to  the  spot.  "  If  any  one  were 
to  give  you  a  shilling,  my  dear,"  he  said, 
"  what  would  you  do  with  it  ?  "  The  child 
was  confused  and  she  murmured  softly, 
"I  don't  know,  sir."  "Well,"  he  con- 
tinued, "if  any  one  were  to  give  you  two 
shillings,  what  would  you  do  with  it  ? " 
She  said  she  would  save  it.  "But  what  if 
it  were  three  shillings  ?  "  he  went  on,  and 
every  time  he  spoke  he  dropped  a  silver 
coin  into  her  hand,  till  he  must  have  given 
her  more  than  a  dozen  of  them.  "  Four  — 
five  —  six  —  seven  —  what  would  you  do 
with  the  money  ?  "  "I  would  give  it  to  my 
mother,  sir,"  she  answered  at  last,  her  little 
face  all  smiles,  gazing  up  at  the  stately, 
sombre  stranger,  whose  noble  countenance 
never  looked  more  radiant  than  it  did  then, 
with  gentle  kindness  and  pleasure.  It  is  a 
trifle  to  mention,  but  it  was  touching  in  its 
simplicity  ;  and  that  amused  group  around 
the  grave  of  Southey,  in  the  blaze  of  the 
golden  sun  of  a  July  afternoon,  with  Skid- 


96  THE   LAND   OF   WORDSWORTH. 

daw  looming  vast  and  majestic  over  all,  will 
linger  with  me  as  long  as  anything  lovely 
and  of  good  report  is  treasured  in  my 
memory.  Lcng  after  we  had  left  the  place 
I  chanced  to  speak  of  its  peculiar  interest. 
"  The  most  interesting  thing  I  saw  there," 
said  Irving,  "  was  that  sweet  child."  I  do 
not  think  the  great  actor  was  ever  much 
impressed  with  the  beauties  of  the  lake 
poets. 

Another  picture  glimmers  across  my 
dream  —  a  picture  of  peace  and  happiness 
which  may  close  this  rambling  reminis- 
cence of  gentle  days.  We  had  driven  up 
the  pass  between  Glencoin  and  Gowbarrow, 
and  had  reached  Matterdale,  on  our  way 
toward  Troutbeck  station  —  not  the  beauti- 
ful Windermere  Troutbeck,  but  the  less 
famous  one.  The  road  is  lonely,  but  at 
Matterdale  one  sees  a  few  houses,  and  there 
our  gaze  was  attracted  by  a  small  gray 
church  nestled  in  a  hollow  of  the  hillside. 
It  stands  sequestered  in  its  little  place  of 
graves,  with  bright  greensward  around  it 
and  a  few  trees.  A  faint  sound  of  organ 
music  floated  from  this  sacred  building  and 
seemed  to  deepen  the  hush  of  the  summer 
wind  and  shed  a  holier  calm  upon  the  lovely 
solitude.      We   dismounted  and  softly  en- 


THE   LAND    OF    WORDSWORTH.  97 

tered  the  church.  A  youth  and  a  maiden, 
apparently  lovers,  were  sitting  at  the  organ 
—  the  young  fellow  playing  and  the  girl 
listening,  and  looking  with  tender  trust  and 
innocent  affection  into  his  face.  He  recog- 
nised our  presence  with  a  kindly  nod,  but 
went  on  with  his  anthem.  I  do  not  think 
she  saw  us  at  all.  The  place  was  full  of 
soft,  warm  light  streaming  through  the 
stained  glass  of  Gothic  windows  and  fra- 
grant with  perfume  floating  from  the  hay- 
fields  and  the  dew-drenched  roses  of  many 
a  neighbouring  hedge.  Not  a  word  was 
spoken,  and  after  a  few  moments  we  de- 
parted as  silently  as  we  had  come.  Those 
lovers  will  never  know  what  eyes  looked 
upon  them  that  day,  what  hearts  were  com- 
forted with  the  sight  of  their  happiness,  or 
how  a  careworn  man,  three  thousand  miles 
away,  fanning  upon  his  hearthstone  the 
dying  embers  of  hope,  now  thinks  of  them 
with  tender  sympathy,  and  murmurs  a 
blessing  on  the  gracious  scene  which  their 
presence  so  much  endeared. 


98  SHAKESPEARE   RELICS 


VII. 
SHAKESPEARE    RELICS    AT    WORCESTER. 

WORCESTEE,  July  23,  1889.— 
The  present  wanderer  came  lately 
to  "the  Faithful  City,"  and  these  words 
are  written  in  a  midnight  hour  at  the  Uni- 
corn Hotel.  This  place  is  redolent  of  the 
wars  of  the  Stuarts,  and  the  moment  you 
enter  it  your  mind  is  filled  with  the  pres- 
ence of  Charles  the  Martyr,  Charles  the 
Merry,  Prince  Rupert,  and  Oliver  Cromwell. 
From  the  top  of  Red  Hill  and  the  margin  of 
Perry  Wood  —  now  sleeping  in  the  starlight 
or  momentarily  vocal  with  the  rustle  of 
leaves  and  the  note  of  half-awakened  birds 
—  Cromwell  looked  down  over  the  ancient 
walled  city  which  he  had  beleaguered.  Upon 
the  summit  of  the  great  tower  of  Worcester 
cathedral  Charles  and  Rupert  held  their 
last  council  of  war.  Here  was  fought  and 
lost  (1651)  the  battle  that  made  the  merry 
monarch  a  hunted  fugitive  and  an  exile. 
With  a  stranger's  interest  I  have  rambled  on 


AT    WORCESTER.  99 

those  heights  ;  traversed  the  battlefield ; 
walked  in  every  part  of  the  cathedral; 
attended  divine  service  there ;  revelled 
in  the  antiquities  of  Edgar  Tower ;  roamed 
through  most  of  the  city  streets  ;  traced 
all  that  can  be  traced  of  the  old  wall  — 
there  is  little  remaining  of  it  now,  and  no 
part  that  can  be  walked  upon  ;  explored  the 
royal  porcelain  works,  for  which  Worces- 
ter is  rightly  famous ;  viewed  several  of 
its  old  churches  and  its  one  theatre  (in 
Angel  street)  ;  entered  its  Guildhall,  where 
they  preserve  a  fine  piece  of  artillery  and 
nine  suits  of  black  armour  that  were  left 
by  Charles  11.  wiien  he  fled  from  Worces- 
ter ;  paced  the  dusty  and  empty  Trinity 
Hall,  now  abandoned  and  condemned  to 
demolition,  where  once  Queen  Elizabeth 
was  feasted  ;  and  visited  the  old  "  Com- 
mandery  " — a  rare  piece  of  antiquity,  re- 
maining from  the  tenth  century  —  wherein 
the  Duke  of  Hamilton  died  of  his  wounds, 
after  Cromwell's  "crowning  mercy,"  and 
beneath  the  floor  of  which  he  was  laid  in  a 
temporary  grave.  The  Commandery  is  now 
owned  and  occupied  by  a  printer  of  direc- 
tories and  guide-books  (the  genial  and 
hospitable  Mr.  Littlebury),  and  there,  as 
everywhere  else  in  storied  Worcester,  the 


lOO  SHAKESPEARE    RELICS 

arts  of  peace  prevail  over  all  the  scenes  and 
all  the  traces  of 

"  Old,  unhappy,  far-off  things 
And  battles  long  ago." 

In  the  Edgar  Tower  at  Worcester  they 
keep  the  original  of  the  marriage-bond  that 
was  given  as  a  preliminary  to  the  marriage 
of  William  Shakespeare  and  Anne  Hatha- 
way, by  Eulk  Sandells  and  John  Richard- 
son, of  Shottery.  It  is  a  long,  narrow  strip 
of  parchment,  and  it  has  been  glazed  and 
framed.  Two  seals  of  light-coloured  wax 
were  originally  attached  to  it,  dependent 
by  strings,  but  these  were  removed —  ap- 
parently for  the  convenience  of  the  me- 
chanic who  put  this  relic  into  its  present 
frame.  The  handwriting  is  crabbed  and 
obscure.  There  are  but  few  persons  who 
can  read  the  handwriting  in  old  documents 
of  this  kind,  and  thousands  of  such  docu- 
ments exist  in  the  church- archives,  and 
elsewhere  in  England,  that  have  never 
been  examined.  The  name  of  Hathaway 
in  this  marriage-bond  resembles  the  name 
of  Whateley.  The  contract  vouches  that 
there  was  no  impediment,  through  consan- 
guinity or  otherwise,  to  the  marriage  of 
William  Shakespeare  and  Anne  Hathaway. 


AT   WORCESTER.  lOI 

It  was  executed  on  November  28,  1582,  and 
it  is  supposed  that  the  marriage  took  place 
immediately  —  since  the  first  child  of  it, 
Susanna  Shakespeare,  was  baptized  in  the 
church  of  the  Holy  Trinity  at  Stratford  on 
May  26,  1583.  No  registration  of  the  mar- 
riage has  been  found,  but  that  is  no  proof 
that  it  does  not  exist.  The  law  in  those 
days  jDrescribed  that  the  marriage-bond 
should  designate  three  parishes  within  the 
residential  diocese,  in  any  one  of  which 
tne  marriage  might  be  made  ;  but  the  cus- 
tom in  those  days  permitted  the  contract- 
ing parties,  when  they  had  complied  with 
this  legal  requirement,  to  be  married  in 
whatever  parish,  within  the  diocese,  they 
might  prefer.  Three  parishes  were  named 
in  the  Shakespeare  marriage-bond.  The  reg- 
isters of  two  of  them  have  been  searched, 
and  searched  in  vain.  The  register  of  the 
third  —  that  of  Luddington,  which  is  close 
by  Shottery  —  was  destroyed  long  ago,  in  a 
fire  that  burnt  down  Luddington  church  ; 
and  conjecture  therefore  assumes  that 
Shakespeare  was  married  at  Luddington. 
It  may  be  so,  but  there  is  no  certainty 
about  it,  and  until  every  old  church  regis- 
ter in  the  ancient  diocese  of  Worcester  has 
been  examined,  the  quest  of  the  registra- 


102  SHAKESPEARE    RELICS 

tion  of  his  marriage  ought  not  to  be  aban- 
doned, Richard  Savage,  the  learned  and 
diligent  librarian  of  the  Shakespeare  Birth- 
place, has  long  been  occupied  with  this 
inquiry,  and  he  has  transcribed  several  of 
the  old  church  registers  in  the  vicinity  of 
Stratford.  The  Rev.  Thomas  Proctor  Wad- 
ley,  another  local  antiquary  of  great  learn- 
ing and  incessant  industry,  has  also  taken 
part  in  this  labour.  The  ^ong-desired  entry 
of  the  marriage  of  William  and  Anne  re- 
mains undiscovered,  but  one  gratifying  and 
valuable  result  of  these  investigations  is  the 
disclosure  that  many  of  the  names  used  in 
Shakespeare's  works  are  the  names  of  per- 
sons who  were  residents  of  Warwickshire 
in  his  time.  It  has  pleased  various  crazy 
sensation-mongers  to  ascribe  the  authorship 
of  Shakespeare's  writings  to  Francis  Bacon. 
This  could  only  be  done  by  ignoring  posi- 
tive evidence  —  the  evidence,  namely,  of  Ben 
Jonson,  who  knew  Shakespeare  personally, 
and  who  has  left  a  written  description  of 
the  manner  in  which  Shakespeare  composed 
his  plays.  Effrontery  was  to  be  expected 
from  the  advocates  of  the  preposterous 
Bacon  theory  ;  but  when  they  have  ignored 
the  positive  evidence,  and  the  internal  evi- 
dence, and  the  circumstantial  evidence,  and 


AT   WORCESTER.  IO3 

every  other  sort  of  evidence,  they  have 
still  a  serious  obstacle  to  surmount  —  an 
obstacle  that  the  researches  of  such  patient 
scholars  as  Mr.  Savage  and  Mr.  Wadley 
are  strengthening  day  by  day.  The  man 
who  wrote  Shakespeare's  plays  knew  War- 
wickshire as  it  could  only  be  known  to 
a  native  of  it ;  and  there  is  no  proof  that 
Francis  Bacon  knew  it  or  ever  was  in  it. 

With  reference  to  the  Shakespeare  mar- 
riage-bond, and  with  reference  to  all  the 
records  that  are  kept  in  the  Edgar  Tower 
at  Worcester,  it  should  perhaps  be  said  that 
they  are  not  preserved  with  the  scrupulous 
care  to  which  such  treasures  are  entitled. 
The  Tower  —  a  gi-ay  and  venerable  relic,  an 
ancient  gate  of  the  monastery,  dating  back 
to  the  time  of  King  John  —  affords  an  ap- 
propriate receptacle  for  those  documents  ; 
but  it  would  not  withstand  fire,  and  it  does 
not  contain  either  a  fire-proof  chamber  or 
a  safe.  The  Shakespeare  marriage-bond  — 
which  assuredly  ought  to  be  in  the  Shake- 
speare Birthplace,  at  Stratford  —  was  taken 
from  the  floor  of  a  closet,  where  it  had  been 
lying,  together  with  a  number  of  dusty 
books,  and  I  was  kindly  permitted  to  hold 
it  in  my  hands  and  to  examine  it.  The 
frame  provided  for  this  priceless  relic  is 


104  SHAKESPEARE    RELICS 

such  as  you  may  see  on  an  ordinary  scliool 
slate.  From  another  dusty  closet  an  attend- 
ant extricated  a  manuscript  diary  kept  by 
William  Lloyd,  Bishop  of  Worcester  (1627- 
1717),  and  by  his  man-servant,  for  several 
years,  about  the  beginning  of  the  reign  of 
Queen  Anne  ;  and  in  this  are  many  quaint 
and  humorous  entries,  valuable  to  the  stu- 
dent of  history  and  manners.  In  still  an- 
other closet,  having  the  appearance  of  a 
rubbish-bin,  I  saw  heaps  upon  heaps  of  old 
parchment  and  paper  wi'itings  —  a  mass  of 
antique  registry  that  it  would  need  the  la- 
bour of  several  years  to  examine,  decipher, 
and  classify.  Worcester  is  especially  rich 
in  old  records,  and  it  is  not  impossible  that 
the  missing  clew  to  Shakespeare's  marriage 
may  yet  be  found  on  that  spot  —  where 
nobody  has  expected  to  find  it. 

Worcester  is  rich  also  in  a  superb  library, 
which,  by  the  kindness  of  Mr.  Hooper,  the 
custodian,  I  was  allowed  to  explore,  high 
up  beneath  the  roof  of  the  lovely  cathedral. 
That  collection  of  books,  numbering  about 
five  thousand,  consists  mostly  of  folios, 
many  of  which  were  printed  in  France. 
They  keep  it  in  a  long,  low,  oak-timbered 
room,  the  triforium  of  the  south  aisle  of  the 
nave.     The  approach  is  by  a  circular  stone 


AT   WORCESTER.  I05 

staircase.  In  an  anteroom  to  the  library  I 
saw  a  part  of  the  ancient  north  door  of  this 
church,  —  a  fragment  dating  back  to  the 
time  of  Bishop  Wakefield,  1386 — to  which 
is  still  afi&xed  a  piece  of  the  skin  of  a  human 
being.  The  tradition  is  that  a  Dane  com- 
mitted sacrilege,  by  stealing  the  sanctus 
bell  from  the  high  altar,  and  was  thereupon 
flayed  alive  for  his  crime,  and  the  skin  of 
him  was  fastened  to  the  cathedral  door.  In 
the  library  are  magnificent  editions  of  Aris- 
totle and  other  classics ;  the  works  of  the 
fathers  of  the  church ;  a  beautiful  illumi- 
nated manuscript  of  Wickliffe's  New  Testa- 
ment —  written  on  vellum  in  1381 ;  and 
several  books,  in  splendid  preservation, 
from  the  press  of  Caxton  and  that  of  Wyn- 
ken  de  Worde.  The  world  moves  —  but 
printing  is  not  better  done  now  than  it  was 
then.  This  library,  which  is  for  the  use  of 
the  clergy  of  the  diocese  of  Worcester,  was 
founded  by  Bishop  Carpenter  in  1461,  and 
originally  was  stored  in  the  chapel  of  the 
charnel-house. 

Reverting  to  the  subject  of  old  docu- 
ments, a  useful  word  may  perhaj^s  be  said 
here  about  the  registers  in  Trinity  church 
at  Stratford  —  documents  which,  in  a  spirit 
of    disparagement,   have   sometimes    been 


Io6  SHAKESPEARE    RELICS 

designated  as  "  copies."  This  sort  of  pert- 
ness  in  the  discussion  of  Shakespearean 
subjects  is  not  unnatural  in  days  wlien 
fanatical  zealots  are  allowed  freely  to  be- 
smirch the  memory  of  Shakespeare,  in  their 
wildly  foolish  advocacy  of  what  they  call 
the  Bacon  theory  of  the  authorship  of 
Shakespeare's  works.  The  facts  about  the 
Stratford  Kegisters,  as  here  set  down,  are 
stated,  by  one  who  has  many  times  held 
them  in  his  hands  and  explored  their  quaint 
pages.  Those  records  are  contained  in 
twenty-two  volumes.  They  begin  with  the 
first  year  of  Queen  Elizabeth,  1558,  and 
they  end,  as  to  the  old  parchment  form,  in 
1812.  From  1558  to  1600  the  entries  were 
made  in  a  paper  book,  of  the  quarto  form, 
still  occasionally  to  be  found  in  ancient 
parish  churches  of  England.  In  1600  an 
order-in-council  was  made  commanding 
that  those  entries  should  be  copied  into 
parchment  volumes,  for  their  better  preser- 
vation. This  was  done.  The  parchment 
volumes,  which  have  been  freely  shown  to 
me  by  my  good  friend  William  Butcher,  the 
parish  clerk  of  Stratford,  date  back  to  1600. 
The  handwriting  of  the  copied  portion,  cov- 
ering the  period  from  1558  to  1600,  is  care, 
ful  and  uniform.     Each  page  is  certified,  as 


AT    WORCESTER.  I07 

to  its  accuracy,  by  the  vicar  and  the  church- 
wardens. After  1600  the  handwritings  vary. 
In  the  register  of  marriage  a  new  handwrit- 
ing appears  on  September  17  that  year,  and 
in  tlie  registers  of  Baptism  and  Burial  it 
appears  on  September  20.  The  sequence 
of  marriages  is  complete  until  1756  ;  that  of 
baptisms  and  burials  until  1812  ;  when  in 
each  case  a  book  of  printed  forms  comes 
into  use,  and  the  expeditious  march  of  the 
new  age  begins.  The  entry  of  Shakespeare's 
baptism,  April  26,  1564,  from  which  it  is 
inferred  that  he  was  born  on  April  23,  is 
extant  as  a  certified  copy  from  the  earlier 
paper  book.  The  entry  of  Shakespeare's 
burial  is  the  original  entry  made  in  the 
original  register. 

Some  time  ago  an  American  writer  chose 
to  declare  that  Shakespeare's  widow  — 
seven  years  his  senior  at  the  start,  and 
therefore  fifty-nine  years  old  when  he  died 
—  subsequently  contracted  another  mar- 
riage. Mrs.  Shakespeare  survived  her  hus- 
band seven  years,  dying  at  the  age  of  sixty- 
six.  The  entry  in  the  Stratford  register  of 
burial  contains,  against  the  date  of  1623, 
August  28,  the  names  of  "  Mrs.  Shake- 
speare "  and  "  Anna  uxor  Richard  James." 
These  two  names,  written  one  above  the 


Io8  SHAKESPEARE    RELICS. 

other,  are  connected  by  a  bracket  on  the 
left  side ;  and  this  is  supposed  to  be  evi- 
dence that  Shakespeare's  widow  married 
again.  The  use  of  the  bracket  could  not 
possibly  mislead  anybody  possessing  the 
faculty  of  clear  vision.  When  two  or  more 
persons  were  baptized  or  buried  on  the 
same  day  the  parish  clerk,  in  making  the 
requisite  entry  in  the  register,  connected 
their  names  with  a  bracket.  Three  instances 
of  this  practice  occur  upon  a  single  page 
of  the  register,  in  the  same  handwriting, 
close  to  the  page  that  records  the  burial,  on 
the  same  day,  of  Mrs.  Shakespeare,  widow, 
and  Anna  the  wife  of  Eichard  James.  But 
folly  needs  only  a  slender  hook  on  which  to 
hang  itself. 

Prince  Arthur,  eldest  son  of  Henry  VII., 
is  buried  in  a  beautiful  chapel  in  Worcester 
cathedral.  Bishop  Gauden  rests  there,  who 
wrote  Eikon  Basilike,  The  Duke  of  Ham- 
ilton was  transferred  there,  from  the  Com- 
mandery.  And  in  the  Sacrarium  stands 
the  tomb  of  King  John  (obiit  October  19, 
1216,  at  Newark),  in  which,  when  it  was 
opened,  in  1797,  the  remains  of  that  tyrant 
presented  a  ghastly  spectacle. 


BYRON  AND  HUCKNALL-TORKARD.       I09 


VIII. 

BYRON    AND    HUCKNALL-TOKKARD. 

ON  a  night  in  1785,  when  Mrs.  Siddons 
was  acting  at  Edinburgh,  the  play 
being  Tlie  Fatal  Marriage  and  the  char- 
acter Isabella,  a  young  lady  of  Aberdeen- 
shire, Miss  Catherine  Gordon,  of  Gight,was 
among  the  audience.  There  is  a  point  in 
that  tragedy  at  which  Isabella  recognises 
her  first  husband,  whom  she  had  supposed 
to  be  dead,  and  in  whose  absence  she  had 
been  married  to  another,  and  her  conster- 
nation, grief,  and  rapture  are  sudden  and 
excessive.  Mrs.  Siddons,  at  that  point, 
always  made  a  great  effect.  The  words 
are,  "OmyBiron,  my  Biron  !  "  On  this 
night,  at  the  moment  when  the  wonderful 
actress  sent  forth  her  wailing,  heart-pierc- 
ing cry,  as  she  uttered  those  words.  Miss 
Gordon  gave  a  frantic  scream,  fell  into 
violent  hysterics,  and  was  borne  out  of 
the  theatre,  repeating  "0  my  Biron,  my 
Biron  !  "     At  the  time  of  that  incident  she 


no      BYRON  AND  HUCKNALL-TORKARD. 

had  not  met  tlie  man  by  whom  she  was 
afterward  wedded  —  the  Hon.  John  Byron, 
whose  wife  she  became  about  a  year  later. 
Their  first-born  and  only  child  was  George 
Gordon,  afterward  Lord  Byron,  the  poet ; 
and  among  the  many  aspects  of  his  life 
which  impress  the  thoughtful  reader  of  that 
strange  and  melancholy  story  none  is  more 
striking  than  the  dramatic  aspect  of  it  —  so 
strangely  prefigured  in  this  event. 

Censure  of  Byron,  whether  as  a  man  or  as 
a  writer,  may  be  considered  to  have  spent 
its  force.  It  is  a  hundred  years  (January 
22,  1888),  since  he  was  born,  and  almost  as 
many  since  he  died.  Everybody  who  wished 
to  say  a  word  against  him  has  had  ample 
oi^portunity  for  saying  it,  and  there  is 
evidence  that  this  opportunity  has  not  been 
neglected.  The  record  was  long  ago  made 
up.  Everybody  knows  that  Byron's  con- 
duct was  sometimes  deformed  with  frenzy 
and  stained  with  vice.  Everybody  knows 
that  Byron's  writings  are  occasionally 
marred  with  profanity  and  licentiousness, 
and  that  they  contain  a  quantity  of  crude 
verse.  If  he  had  never  been  married,  or  if, 
being  married,  his  domestic  life  had  not 
ended  in  disaster  and  scandal,  his  personal 
reputation  would  stand  higher  than  it  does 


BYRON  AND  HUCKNALL-TORKARD.       1 1 1 

at  present,  in  the  esteem  of  virtuous  society. 
If  about  one-third  of  wliat  he  wrote  had 
never  been  publislied,  his  reputation  as  a 
man  of  letters  would  stand  higher  than  it 
now  does  m  the  esteem  of  the  sternest 
judges  of  literary  art.  After  an  exhaustive 
discussion  of  the  subject  in  every  aspect  of 
it,  after  every  variety  of  hostile  assault,  and 
after  praise  sounded  in  every  key  of  en- 
thusiasm and  in  every  language  of  the 
world,  these  truths  remain.  It  is  a  pity 
that  Byron  was  not  a  virtuous  man  and  a 
good  husband.  It  is  a  pity  that  he  was  not 
invariably  a  scrupulous  literary  artist,  that 
he  wrote  so  much,  and  that  almost  every- 
thing he  wrote  was  published.  But,  when 
all  this  has  been  said,  it  remains  a  solid 
and  immovable  truth  that  Byron  was  a 
great  poet  and  that  he  continues  to  be  a 
great  power  in  the  literature  and  life  of  the 
world.  Nobody  who  pretends  to  read  any- 
thing omits  to  read  Childe  Harold. 

To  touch  this  complex  and  delicate  sub- 
ject in  only  a  superficial  manner  it  may  not 
be  amiss  to  say  that  the  world  is  under 
obligation  to  Byron,  if  for  nothing  else, 
for  the  spectacle  of  a  romantic,  impressive, 
and  instructive  life.  His  agency  in  that 
spectacle  no    doubt   was   involuntary,  but 


112      BYROX  AND  HUCKNALL-TORKARD. 

all  the  same  he  presented  it.  He  was  a 
great  poet ;  a  man  of  genius  ;  his  faculty  of 
expression  was  colossal,  and  his  conduct 
was  absolutely  genuine.  No  man  in  litera- 
ture ever  lived  who  lived  himself  more 
fully.  His  assumptions  of  disguise  only 
made  him  more  obvious  and  transparent. 
He  kept  nothing  back.  His  heart  was  laid 
absolutely  bare.  We  know  even  more 
about  him  than  we  know  about  Dr.  Johnson 
—  and  still  his  personality  endures  the  test 
of  our  knowledge  and  remains  unique, 
romantic,  fascinating,  prolific  of  moral  ad- 
monition, and  infinitely  pathetic.  Byron 
in  poetry,  like  Edmund  Kean  in  acting,  is  a 
figure  that  completely  fills  the  imagination, 
profoundly  stirs  the  heart,  and  never  ceases 
to  impress  and  charm,  even  while  it  afflicts, 
the  sensitive  mind.  This  consideration 
alone,  viewed  apart  from  the  obligation 
that  the  world  owes  to  the  better  part  of 
his  writings,  is  vastly  significant  of  the 
great  personal  force  that  is  inherent  in  the 
name  and  memory  of  Byron. 

It  has  been  considered  necessary  to  ac- 
count for  the  sadness  and  gloom  of  Byron's 
poetry  by  representing  him  to  have  been  a 
criminal  afflicted  with  remorse  for  his  many 
and  hideous  crimes.      His  widow,  appar- 


BYRON  AND  HUCKNALL-TOKKARD.       1 13 

ently  a  monomaniac,  after  long  brooding 
over  the  remembrance  of  a  calamitous  mar- 
ried life  —  brief  but  unhappy,  and  termin- 
ated in  separation  —  whispered  against  him, 
and  against  his  half-sister,  a  vile  and  hid- 
eous charge  ;  and  this,  to  the  disgi'ace  of 
American  literature,  was  subsequently 
brought  forward  by  a  distinguished  female 
writer  of  America,  much  noted  for  her 
works  of  fiction  and  especially  memora- 
ble for  this  one.  The  explanation  of  the 
mental  distress  exhibited  in  the  poet's 
writings  was  thought  to  be  effectually  pro- 
vided in  that  disclosure.  But,  as  this  re- 
volting and  inhuman  story  —  desecrating 
graves,  insulting  a  wonderful  genius,  and 
casting  infamy  upon  the  name  of  an  affec- 
tionate, faithful,  virtuous  woman  —  fell  to 
pieces  the  moment  it  was  examined,  the 
student  of  Byron's  grief- stricken  nature  re- 
mained no  wiser  than  before  this  figment  oi 
a  diseased  imagination  had  been  divulged. 
Surely,  however,  it  ought  not  to  be  con- 
sidered mysterious  that  Byron's  poetry  is 
often  sad.  The  best  poetry  of  the  best 
poets  is  touched  with  sadness.  Hamlet 
has  never  been  mistaken  for  a  merry 
production.  Macbeth  and  King  Lear  do 
not  commonly  produce  laughter.     Shelley 

H 


114      BYRON  AND  HUCKNALL-TORKARD. 

and  Keats  sing  as  near  to  heaven's  gate  as 
anybody,  and  both  of  them  are  essentially 
sad.  Scott  was  as  brave,  hopeful,  and 
cheery  as  any  poet  that  ever  lived,  and 
Scott's  poetry  is  at  its  best  in  his  dirges 
and  his  ballads  of  love  and  loss.  The 
Elegy  and  Tlie  Ancient  Mariner  certainly 
are  great  poems,  but  neither  of  them  is 
festive.  Byron  often  wi'ote  sadly  because  he 
was  a  man  of  a  melancholy  temperament, 
and  because  he  deeply  felt  the  pathos  of 
mortal  life,  the  awful  mystery  with  which 
it  is  surrounded,  the  pam  with  which  it  is 
usually  attended,  the  tragedy  with  which  it 
commonly  is  accompanied,  the  frail  tenure 
with  which  its  loves  and  hopes  are  held, 
and  the  inexorable  death  with  which  it  is 
continually  environed  and  at  last  extin- 
guished. And  Byron  was  an  unhappy  man 
for  the  reason  that,  possessing  every  ele- 
mental natural  quality  in  excess,  his  ex- 
quisite goodness  was  constantly  outraged 
and  tortured  by  his  inordinate  evil.  The 
tempest,  the  clangour,  and  the  agony  of  his 
writings  are  denotements  of  the  struggle 
between  good  and  evil  that  was  perpetually 
afflicting  his  soul.  Had  he  been  the  wicked 
man  depicted  by  his  detractors  he  would 
have  lived  a  life  of  comfortable  depravity 


BYRON  AXD  HUCKXALL-TORKARD.       II5 

and    never    would    have    written    at    all. 
Monsters  do  not  suffer. 

The  true  appreciation  of  Byron  is  not 
that  of  youtli  but  that  of  manhood.  Youth 
is  captured  by  his  pictorial  and  sentimental 
attributes.  Youtli  beholds  him  as  a  nautical 
Adonis,  standing  lonely  upon  a  barren  cliff 
and  gazing  at  a  stormy  sunset  over  the 
-S^gean  sea.  Everybody  knows  that  famil- 
iar picture  —  with  the  wide,  open  collar,  the 
great  eyes,  the  wild  hair,  and  the  ample 
neckcloth  flowing  in  the  breeze.  It  is  pretty 
but  it  is  not  like  the  real  man.  If  ever  at 
any  time  he  was  that  sentimental  image  he 
speedily  outgrew  that  condition,  just  as 
those  observers  of  him  who  truly  under- 
stand Byron  have  long  outgrown  their  juve- 
nile sympathy  with  that  frail  and  puny 
ideal  of  a  great  poet.  Manhood  perceives  a 
different  individual  and  is  captured  by  a 
different  attraction.  It  is  only  when  the 
first  extravagant  and  effusive  enthusiasm 
has  run  its  course,  and  perhaps  ended  in 
revulsion,  that  we  come  to  know  Byron  for 
what  he  is  really  worth,  and  to  feel  the  tre- 
mendous power  of  his  genius.  Sentimental 
folly  has  commemorated  him  in  the  margin 
of  Hyde  Park,  as  in  the  fancy  of  many  a 
callow  youth  and  green  girl,  with  the  statue 


Il6     BYRON  AND  HUCKNALL-TORKARD. 

of  a  pretty  sailor-lad  waiting  for  a  spark 
from  heaven,  while  a  big  Newfoundland 
dog  dozes  at  his  feet.  It  is  a  caricature. 
Byron  was  a  man,  and  terribly  in  earnest ; 
and  it  is  only  by  earnest  persons  that  his 
mind  and  works  are  understood.  At  this 
distance  of  time  the  scandals  of  a  corrupt 
age,  equally  with  the  frailties  of  its  most 
brilliant  and  most  illustrious  poetical  gen- 
ius, may  well  be  left  to  rest  in  the  oblivion 
of  the  grave.  The  generation  that  is  living 
at  the  close  of  the  nineteenth  century  will 
remember  of  Byron  only  that  he  was  the 
uncompromising  friend  of  liberty  ;  that  he 
did  much  to  emancipate  the  human  mind 
from  every  form  of  bigotry  and  tyranny  ; 
that  he  augmented,  as  no  man  had  done 
since  Dryden,  the  power  and  flexibility  of 
the  noble  English  tongue  ;  and  that  he  en- 
riched literature  with  passages  of  poetry 
which,  for  sublimity,  beauty,  tenderness, 
and  eloquence,  have  seldom  been  equalled 
and  have  never  been  excelled. 

It  was  near  the  close  of  a  fragrant,  golden 
summer  day  (August  8,  1884)  when,  having 
driven  out  from  Nottingham,  I  alighted  in 
the  market-place  of  the  little  town  of  Huck- 
nall-Torkard,  on  a  pilgrimage  to  the  grave 
of  Byron.     The  town  is  modern  and  com- 


V 

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BYRON  AND  IIUCKNALL-TORKARD.      II7 

monplace  in  appearance  —  a  little  strag- 
gling collection  of  low  brick  dwellings, 
mostly  occupied  by  colliers.  On  that  day 
it  appeared  at  its  worst ;  for  tiie  widest 
part  of  its  main  street  was  filled  with  stalls, 
benches,  wagons,  and  canvas-covered  struct- 
ures for  the  display  of  vegetables  and  other 
commodities,  which  were  thus  offered  for 
sale  ;  and  it  was  thronged  with  rough,  noisy, 
and  dirty  persons,  intent  on  barter  and  traf- 
fic, and  not  indisposed  to  boisterous  pranks 
and  mirth,  as  they  pushed  and  jostled  each 
other  among  the  crowded  booths.  This 
main  street  ends  at  the  wall  of  the  grave- 
yard in  which  stands  the  little  gray  church 
where  Byron  was  buried.  There  is  an  iron 
gate  in  the  centre  of  the  wall,  and  in  ordej 
to  reach  this  it  was  necessary  to  thread  the 
mazes  of  the  market-place,  and  to  push 
aside  the  canvas  flaps  of  a  peddler's  stall 
which  had  been  placed  close  against  it. 
Next  to  the  churchyard  wall  is  a  little  cot- 
tage,i  with  its  bit  of  garden,  devoted  in  this 
instance  to  potatoes  ;  and  there,  while  wait- 

1  Since  this  paper  was  written  tlie  buildings  that 
flanlsed  tlie  churcli  wall  have  been  removed,  the 
street  in  front  of  it  has  been  widened  into  a  square, 
and  the  church  has  been  "  restored  "  and  consider- 
ably  altered. 


115      BYRON  AND  HUCKNALL-TORKARD. 

ing  for  the  sexton,  I  fell  into  talk  with  an 
aged  man,  who  said  that  he  remembered, 
as  an  eye-witness,  the  funeral  of  Byron. 
"  The  oldest  man  he  seemed  that  ever  wore 
gray  hairs."  He  stated  that  he  was  eighty- 
two  and  that  his  name  was  William  Callan- 
dyne.  Pointmg  to  the  church  he  indicated 
the  place  of  the  Byron  vault.  "  I  was  the 
last  man,"  he  said,  "that  went  down  into 
it  before  he  was  buried  there.  I  was  a 
young  fellow  then,  and  curious  to  see  what 
was  going  on.  The  place  was  full  of  skulls 
and  bones.  I  wish  you  could  see  my  son  ; 
he's  a  clever  lad,  only  he  ought  to  have 
more  of  the  suaviter  in  modo.''''  Thus  with 
the  garrulity  of  wandering  age  he  prattled 
on  ;  but  his  mind  was  clear  and  his  memory- 
tenacious  and  positive.  There  is  a  good 
prosjject  from  the  region  of  Hucknall-Tor- 
kard  church,  and  pointing  into  the  distance, 
when  his  mind  had  been  brought  back  to 
the  subject  of  Byron,  my  venerable  ac- 
quaintance now  described,  with  minute 
specification  of  road  and  lane  —  seeming  to 
assume  that  the  names  and  the  turnings 
were  familiar  to  his  auditor  —  the  route  of 
the  funeral  train  from  Nottingham  to  the 
church.  "There  were  eleven  carriages," 
he  said.     "  They  didn't  go  to  the  Abbey  " 


BYRON  AND  HUCKNALL-TOKKAKD.       I.9 

(meaning  Newstead),  "but  came  directly 
here.  Tliere  were  many  people  to  look  at 
them.  I  remember  all  about  it,  and  I'm  an 
old  man  —  eighty-two.  You're  an  Italian, 
I  should  say,"  he  added.  By  this  time  the 
sexton  had  come  and  unlocked  the  gate, 
and  partmg  from  Mr.  Callandyne  we  pres- 
ently made  our  way  into  the  church  of  St. 
James,  locking  the  churchyard  gate  behind 
us  to  exclude  rough  and  possibly  mischiev- 
ous followers.  A  strange  and  sad  contrast, 
I  thought,  between  this  coarse  and  turbu- 
lent place,  by  a  malign  destiny  ordamed  for 
the  grave  of  Byron,  and  that  peaceful, 
lovely,  majestic  church  and  precinct  at 
Stratford-upon-Avon  which  enshrine  the 
dust  of  Shakespeare  ! 

The  sexton  of  the  church  of  St.  James 
and  the  parish  clerk  of  Hucknall-Torkard 
was  Mr.  John  Brown,  and  a  man  of  sympa- 
thetic intelligence,  kmd  heart,  and  interest- 
ing character  I  fomid  him  to  be  —  large, 
dark,  stalwart,  but  gentle  alike  in  manner 
and  feeling,  and  considerate  of  his  visitors. 
The  pilgrim  to  the  literary  shrines  of  Eng- 
land does  not  always  find  the  neighbouring 
inhabitants  either  sympathetic  with  his 
reverence  or  conscious  of  especial  sanctity 
or  interest  appertaining  to  the  relics  which 


I20     BYRON  AND  HUCKNALL-TORKARD. 

they  possess  ;  but  honest  and  manly  John 
Brown  of  Hucknall-Torkard  understood 
both  the  hallowing  charm  of  the  place  and 
the  sentiment,  not  to  say  the  profound 
emotion,  of  the  traveller  who  now  beheld 
for  the  first  time  the  tomb  of  Byron.  This 
church  has  been  restored  and  altered  since 
Byron  was  buried  in  it  in  1824,  yet  in  the 
main  it  retains  its  fundamental  structure 
and  its  ancient  peculiarities.  The  tower, 
a  fine  specimen  of  Norman  architecture, 
strongly  built,  dark  and  grim,  gives  indica- 
tion of  great  age.  It  is  of  a  kind  often  met 
with  in  ancient  English  towns  :  you  may 
see  its  brothers  at  York,  Shrewsbury,  Can- 
terbury, Worcester,  Warwick,  and  in  many 
places  sprinkled  over  the  northern  heights 
of  London  :  but  amid  its  tame  surroundings 
in  this  little  colliery  settlement  it  looms  with 
a  peculiar  frowning  majesty,  a  certain  bleak 
loneliness,  both  unique  and  impressive.  The 
church  is  of  the  customary  ciTicial  form  — 
a  low  stone  structure,  peak-roofed  outside, 
but  arched  within,  the  roof  being  supported 
by  four  great  pillars  on  either  side  of  the 
centre  aisle,  and  the  ceiling  being  fashioned 
of  heavy  timbers  forming  almost  a  true  arch 
above  the  nave.  There  are  four  large  win- 
dows on  each  side  of  the  church,  and  two 


BYRON  AND  HUCKNALL-TORKARD.      121 

on  each  side  of  the  chancel,  which  is  beneatn 
a  roof  somewhat  lower  than  that  of  the  main 
buildino;.  Under  the  pavement  of  the  chan- 
cel and.  hack  of  the  altar  rail  —  at  which  it 
was  my  privilege  to  kneel  while  gazing  upon 
this  sacred  spot  —  is  the  grave  of  Byron,  i 
Nothing  is  written  on  the  stone  that  covers 
his  sepulchre  except  the  simple  name  of 
BYRON,  with  the  dates  of  his  birth  and 
death,  in  brass  letters,  surrounded  by  a 
wreath  of  leaves  in  brass,  the  gift  of  the 
King  of  Greece  ;  and  never  did  a  name  seem 
more  stately  or  a  place  more  hallowed.  The 
dust  of  the  poet  reposes  between  that  of 
his  mother,  on  his  right  hand,  and  that  of 
his  Ada  — ' '  sole  daughter  of  my  house  and 
heart "  —  on  his  left.  The  mother  died  on 
August  1,  1811 ;  the  daughter,  who  had  by 
marriage  become  the  Countess  of  Lovelace, 
in  1852.  "  I  buried  herwith  my  o^vn  hands," 
said  the  sexton,  John  Brown,  when,  after  a 
little  time,  he  rejoined  me  at  the  altar  rail. 
' '  I  told  them  exactly  where  he  was  laid 
when  they  wanted  to  put  that  brass  on  the 

1  Revisiting  this  place  on  September  10,  1890  I 
found  that  the  chancel  has  been  lengthened,  that  the 
altar  and  the  ranral  tablets  have  been  moved  back- 
ward from  the  Byron  vault,  and  that  the  gravestone 
is  now  outside  of  the  rail. 


122      BYRON  AND  HUCKNALL-TORKARD. 

stone  ;  I  remembered  it  well,  for  I  lowered 
the  coffin  of  the  Countess  of  Lovelace  into 
this  vault,  and  laid  her  by  her  father's 
side."  And  when  presently  we  went  into 
a  little  vestry  he  produced  the  Kegister  of 
Burials  and  displayed  the  record  of  that 
interment  in  the  following  words:  "1852. 
Died  at  69  Cumberland  Place,  London. 
Buried  December  3.  Aged  thirty-six.  — 
Curtis  Jackson. ' '  The  Byrons  were  a  short- 
lived race.  The  poet  himself  had  just  turned 
thirty-six  ;  his  mother  was  only  forty-six 
when  she  passed  away.  This  name  of 
Curtis  Jackson  in  the  register  was  that  of 
the  rector  or  curate  then  incumbent  but 
now  departed.  The  register  is  a  long  nar- 
row book  made  of  parchment  and  full  of 
various  crabbed  handwritings  —  a  record 
similar  to  those  which  are  so  carefully 
treasured  at  the  church  of  the  Holy  Trinity 
at  Stratford  ;  but  it  is  more  dilapidated. 

Another  relic  shown  by  John  Brown  was 
a  bit  of  embroidery,  presenting  the  arms  of 
the  Byron  family.  It  had  been  used  at 
Byron's  funeral,  and  thereafter  was  long 
kept  in  the  church,  though  latterly  with 
but  little  care.  When  the  Kev.  Curtis 
Jackson  came  there  he  beheld  this  frail 
memorial  with  pious  disapprobation.     "  He 


BVKOX  AXD  HUCKNALL-TOUKARD.      1 23 

told  me,"  said  the  sexton,  -'to  take  it  home 
and  burn  it.  I  did  take  it  home,  but  I 
didn't  burn  it ;  and  wlien  the  new  rector 
came  he  heard  of  it  and  asked  me  to  brmg 
it  back,  and  a  lady  gave  the  frame  to  put  it 
in."  Framed  it  is,  and  likely  now  to  be 
always  preserved  in  this  interesting  church  ; 
and  earnestly  do  I  wish  that  I  could  re- 
member, in  order  that  I  might  speak  it  with 
honour,  the  name  of  the  clergyman  who 
could  thus  rebuke  bigotry,  and  welcome 
and  treasure  in  his  church  that  shred  of  silk 
which  once  rested  on  the  coffin  of  Byron. 
Still  another  relic  preserved  by  John  Brown 
is  a  large  piece  of  cardboard  giving  the  in- 
scription which  is  upon  the  coffin  of  the 
poet's  mother,  and  which  bore  some  part 
in  the  obsequies  of  that  singular  woman  — 
a  creature  full  of  faults,  but  the  parent  of 
a  mighty  genius,  and  capable  of  inspiring 
deep  love.  On  the  night  after  Byron  ar- 
rived at  Newstead,  whither  he  repaired 
from  London  on  receiving  news  of  her  ill- 
ness, only  to  find  her  dead,  he  was  found 
sitting  in  the  dark  and  sobbing  beside  the 
corse.  ' '  I  had  but  one  friend  in  the 
world,"  he  said,  "  and  she  is  gone."  He 
was  soon  to  publish  Childe  I/arold,  and  to 
gain  hosts  of  friends  and  have  the  world  at 


124     BYRON  AND  HUCKNALL-TORKARD. 

Ms  feet ;  but  he  spoke  what  he  felt,  and  he 
spoke  the  truth,  in  that  tlark  room  on  that 
desolate  night.  Thoughts  of  these  things, 
and  of  many  other  strange  passages  and 
incidents  in  his  brief,  checkered,  glorious, 
lamentable  life,  thronged  into  my  mind  as 
I  stood  there  in  presence  of  those  relics 
and  so  near  his  dust,  while  the  church  grew 
dark  and  the  silence  seemed  to  deepen  in 
the  dusk  of  the  gathering  night. 

They  have  for  many  years  kept  a  book  at 
the  church  of  Hucknall-Torkard  (the  first 
one,  an  album  given  by  Sir  John  Bowriiig, 
and  containing  the  record  of  visitations 
from  1825  to  1834,  was  stolen  in  the  latter 
year),  in  which  the  visitors  write  their 
names  ;  but  the  catalogue  of  pilgrims  dur- 
ing the  last  fifty  years  is  not  a  long  one. 
The  votaries  of  Byron  are  far  less  numerous 
ohan  those  of  Shakespeare.  Custom  has 
made  the  visit  to  Stratford  ' '  a  property  of 
easiness,"  and  Shakespeare  is  a  safe  no 
less  than  a  rightful  object  of  worship.  The 
visit  to  Hucknall-Torkard  is  neither  so  easy 
nor  so  agreeable,  and  it  requires  some 
courage  to  be  a  worshipper  of  Byron — ■ 
and  to  own  it.  No  day  passes  without 
bringing  its  visitor  to  the  Shakespeare  cot- 
tage  and    the    Shakespeare    tomb ;  many 


BYROX  AXD  HUCKNALL-TORKARD.      1 25 

days  pass  without  bringing  a  stranger  to 
the  church  of  St.  James.  On  the  capital  of 
a  column  near  Byron's  tomb  I  saw  two 
mouldering  wTeaths  of  laurel,  which  had 
huug  there  for  years ;  one  brought  by  the 
Bishop  of  Norwich,  the  other  by  the  Ameri- 
can poet  Joaquin  Miller.  It  was  good  to 
see  them,  and  especially  to  see  them  close 
by  the  tablet  of  white  marble  which  was 
placed  on  that  church  wall  to  commemorate 
the  poet,  and  to  be  her  witness  in  death, 
by  his  loving  and  beloved  sister  Augusta 
Mary  Leigh  —  a  name  that  is  the  synonym 
of  noble  fidelity,  a  name  that  in  our  day 
cruel  detraction  and  hideous  calumny  have 
done  their  worst  to  tarnish.  That  tablet 
names  him  "  The  Author  of  Childe  Harold's 
Pilgrimage "  ;  and  if  the  conviction  of 
thoughtful  men  and  women  throughout  the 
world  can  be  accepted  as  an  authority,  no 
name  in  the  long  annals  of  English  litera- 
ture is  more  certain  of  immortality  than  the 
name  of  Byron.  People  mention  the  poetry 
of  Spenser  and  Cowley  and  Dryden  and 
Cowper,  but  the  poetry  of  Byron  they  read. 
His  reputation  can  afford  the  absence  of  all 
memorial  to  him  in  Westminster  Abbey 
and  it  can  endure  the  neglect  and  censure 
of  the  precinct  of  Nottingham.     That  city 


126     BYRON  AND  HUCKNALL-TORKARD. 

rejoices  in  a  stately  castle  throned  upon  a 
rock,  and  persons  who  admire  the  Stuarts 
may  exult  in  the  recollection  that  there  the 
standard  of  Charles  I.  was  unfurled  in  his 
fatal  war  with  the  Parliament  of  England  ; 
but  all  that  really  hallows  it  for  the  stranger 
of  to-day  and  for  posterity  is  its  association 
with  the  name  of  Byron.  You  will  look  in 
vain,  however,  for  any  adequate  sign  of  his 
former  association  with  that  place.  It  is 
difficult  even  to  find  prints  or  photographs 
of  the  Byron  localities  in  the  shops  of  Not- 
tingham. One  dealer,  from  whom  I  bought 
all  the  Byron  pictures  that  he  possessed, 
was  kind  enough  to  explain  the  situation  in 
one  expressive  sentence :  ' '  Much  more 
ought  to  be  done  here  as  to  Lord  Byron's 
memory,  that  is  the  truth ;  but  the  fact  is 
the  first  families  of  the  county  don't  ap- 
prove of  him. ' ' 

When  we  came  again  into  the  church- 
yard, with  its  many  scattered  graves  and  its 
quaint  stones  and  crosses  leaning  every 
way  and  huddled  in  a  strange  kind  of  or- 
derly confusion,  the  great  dark  tower  stood 
out  bold  and  solitary  in  the  gloaming,  and 
a  chill  wind  of  evening  had  begun  to  moan 
around  its  pinnacles,  and  through  its  mys- 
terious belfry  windows,  and  in  the  few  trees 


BYRON  AND  HUCKNALL-TORKARD.      12/ 

near  by,  which  gave  forth  a  mournful  whis- 
per. It  was  hard  to  leave  the  place,  and 
for  a  long  time  I  stood  near  the  chapel,  just 
above  the  outer  wall  of  the  Byron  vault. 
And  there  the  sexton  told  me  the  story  of 
the  White  Lady  —  pointing,  as  he  spoke,  to 
a  cottage  abutting  on  the  churchyard,  one 
window  in  which  commands  an  easy  view 
of  the  place  of  Byron's  grave.  "  There  she 
lived,",  he  said,  "  and  there  she  died,  and 
there"  (pointing  to  an  unmarked  grave 
near  the  pathway,  about  thirty  feet  from 
the  Byron  vault)  ' '  I  buried  her. "  It  is 
impossible  to  give  his  words  or  to  indicate 
his  earnest  manner.  In  brief,  this  lady, 
whose  story  no  one  knew,  had  taken  up  her 
residence  in  this  cottage  long  subsequent  to 
the  burial  of  Byron,  and  had  remanied 
there  until  she  died.  She  was  pale,  thin, 
handsome,  and  she  wore  white  garments. 
Her  face  was  often  to  be  seen  at  that  win- 
dow, whether  by  night  or  day,  and  she 
seemed  to  be  watching  the  tomb.  Once, 
when  masons  were  repairing  the  church 
wall,  she  was  enabled  to  descend  into  that 
vault,  and  therefrom  she  obtained  a  skull, 
which  she  declared  to  be  Byron's,  and 
which  she  scraped,  polished,  and  made  per- 
fectly white,  and  kept  always  beneath  her 


128      BYRON  AND  HUCKXALL-TORKARD. 

pillow.  It  was  her  request,  often  made  to 
the  sexton,  that  she  might  be  buried  in  the 
churchyard  close  to  the  wall  of  the  poet's 
tomb.  ' '  When  at  last  she  died, ' '  said  John 
Brown,  "they  brought  that  skull  to  me,  and 
I  buried  it  there  in  the  ground.  It  was  one 
of  the  loose  skulls  from  the  old  vault.  She 
thought  it  was  Byron's,  and  it  pleased  her 
to  think  so.  I  might  have  laid  her  close 
to  this  wall.  I  don't  know  why  I  didn't." 
In  those  words  the  sexton's  story  ended. 
It  was  only  one  more  of  the  myriad  hints  of 
that  romance  which  the  life  and  poetry  of 
Byron  have  so  widely  created  and  diffused. 
I  glanced  around  for  some  relic  of  the  place 
that  might  properly  be  taken  away :  there 
was  neither  an  ivy  leaf  blooming  upon  the 
wall  nor  a  flower  growing  in  all  that  ground  ; 
but  into  a  crevice  of  the  rock,  just  above 
his  tomb,  the  wind  had  at  some  time  blown 
a  little  earth,  and  in  this  a  few  blades  of 
grass  were  thinly  rooted.  These  I  gathered, 
and  still  possess,  as  a  memento  of  an  even- 
ing at  Byron's  grave. 

Note  on  the  Missing  Register  of 

HUCKNALL-TORKARD  ChURCH. 

The  Album  that  was  given  to  Hucknall- 
Torkard  Church,  in  1825,  by  Sir  John  Bow- 


BYRON  AND  IIUCKNALL-TORKARD.      1 29 

ring,  to  be  used  as  a  register  of  the  names 
of  visitors  to  Byron's  tomb,  disappeared 
from  that  church  some  time  after  the  year 
1834,  and  it  has  not  since  been  found.  It  is 
supposed  to  have  been  stolen.  In  1834  its 
contents  were  printed, —  from  a  manuscript 
copy  of  it,  which  had  been  obtaiiied  from 
the  sexton, —  in  a  book  of  selections  from 
Byron's  prose,  edited  by  "J.  M.  L."  These 
initials  stand  for  the  name  of  Joseph  Munt 
Langford,  who  died  in  1884.  The  dedica- 
tion of  the  register  is  in  the  following  words : 
"  To  the  immortal  and  illustrious  fame  of 
Lord  Byrox,  the  first  poet  of  the  age  in 
which  he  lived,  these  tributes,  weak  and 
unworthy  of  him,  but  in  themselvvis  sincere, 
are  inscribed  with  the  deepest  reverence.  — 
July  1825."  At  that  time  no  memorial  of 
any  kind  had  been  placed  in  the  church  to 
mark  the  poet's  sepulchre  ;  a  fad  which 
prompted  Sir  John  Bowring  to  begin  his 
Album  with  twenty-eight  lines  of  verse,  of 
which  these  are  the  best :  — 

"A  still,  resistless  influence, 
Unseen  but  felt,  binds  up  the  sense  .  .  . 
And  though  the  master  hand  is  cold, 
And  though  the  lyre  it  once  controlled 
Rests  mute  in  death,  yet  from  the  gloom 
Which  dwells  about  this  holy  tomb 
I 


130     BYRON  AND  HUCKNALL-TORKARD, 

Silence  breathes  out  more  eloquent 
Than  epitapn  or  monument." 

This  register  was  used  from  1825  till 
1834.  It  contains  eight  hundred  and  fifteen 
names,  with  which  are  intertwined  twenty- 
eight  inscriptions  in  verse  and  thirty- six  in 
prose.  The  first  name  is  that  of  Count  Pietro 
Gamba,  who  visited  his  friend's  grave  on 
January  31,  1825  -.  but  this  must  have  been 
a  reminiscent  memorandum,  as  the  book  was 
not  opened  till  the  following  July.  The  next 
entry  was  made  by  Byron's  old  servant,  the 
date  being  September  23,  1825  :  "  William 
Fletcher  visited  his  ever-to-be-lamented 
Lord  and  Master's  tomb."  On  September 
'21,  1828  the  following  singular  record  was 
written  :  "Joseph  Carr,  engraver,  Hound's 
Gate,  Nottingham,  visited  this  place  for  the 
first  time  to  witness  the  funeral  of  Lady 
Byron  [mother  of  the  much  lamented  late 
Lord  Byron],  August  9th,  1811,  whose  cofiin- 
plate  I  engraved,  and  now  I  once  more  re- 
visit the  spot  to  drop  a  tear  as  a  tribute  of 
unfeigned  respect  to  the  mortal  remains  of 
that  noble  British  bard.  'Tho'  lost  to 
sight,  to  memory  dear.'  "  The  next  notable 
entry  is  that  of  September  3,  1829 :  "  Lord 
Byron's  sister,  the  Honourable  Augusta 
Mary  Leigh,  visited  this  church."     Under 


BYRON  AND  HUCKNALL-TORKARB.       I3I 

the  date  of  January  8,  1832  are  found  the 
names  of  "  M.  Van  Buren,  Minister  Pleni- 
potentiary from  the  United  States  ;  Wash- 
ington Irving  ;  John  Van  Buren,  New  York, 
U.S.A.,  and  J.  Wildman."  The  latter,  no 
doubt,  was  Colonel  Wildman,  the  proprie- 
tor of  Newstead  Abbey,  Byron's  old  home, 
now  owned  by  Colonel  Webb.  On  August 
5,  1832  "Mr.  Bunn  (manager  of  Drury 
Lane  theatre,  honoured  by  the  acquaintance 
of  the  illustrious  poet)  visited  Lord  Byron's 
tomb,  with  a  party."  Edward  F.  Flower 
and  Selina  Flower,  of  Stratford-upon-Avon, 
record  their  presence,  on  September  15, 
1832  —  the  parents  of  Charles  Edward 
Flower  and  Edgar  Flower,  of  Stratford,  the 
former  being  the  founder  of  the  Shake- 
speare Memorial.  There  are  several  eccen- 
tric tributes  in  the  register,  but  the  most 
of  them  are  feeble.  One  of  the  better  kind 
is  this :  — 

"  Not  in  that  palace  where  the  dead  repose 
In  splendid  holiness,  where  Time  has  spread 
His  sombre  shadows,  and  a  halo  glows 
Around  the  ashes  of  the  mighty  dead, 
Life's  weary  pilgrim  rests  his  aching  head. 
This  is  his  resting-place,  and  save  his  own 
No  light,  no  glory  round  his  grave  is  shed : 


132       BYRON  AND  HUCKNALL-TORKARD. 

But  memory  journeys  to  his  shrine  alone 
To  mark  how  sound  he  sleeps,  beneath  yon 
simple  stone. 

"Ah,  say,  art  thou  ambitious?   thy  young 

breast  — 
Oh  does  it  pant  for  honours  ?  dost  thou  chase 
The  phantom  Fame,  in  fairy  colours  drest. 
Expecting  all  the  while  to  win  the  race  ? 
Oh,  does  the  flush  of  youth  adorn  thy  face 
And  dost  thou  deem  it  lasting?  dost  thou 

crave 
The    hero's    wreath,    the    poet's    meed    of 

praise  ? 
Learn  that  of  this,  these,  all,  not  one  can 

save 
From    the    chill    hand    of    death.     Behold 

Childe  Harold's  grave  !  " 


HISTORIC   NOOKS   AND   CORNERS.       1 33 


IX. 

HISTORIC    NOOKS   AND   CORNERS. 

STRATFORD-UPON-AVON,  August 
20,  i889.  —  The  traveller  who  hurries 
through  Warwickshire  —  and  American 
travellers  mostly  do  hurry  through  it  —  ap- 
preciates but  little  the  things  that  he  sees 
and  does  not  understand  how  much  he 
loses.  The  customary  course  is  to  lodge  at 
the  Red  Horse  —  which  is  one  of  the  most 
comfortable  houses  in  England  —  and  thus 
to  enjoy  the  associations  that  are  connected 
with  the  visits  of  Washington  Irving.  His 
parlour,  his  bedroom  (number  15),  his  arm- 
chair, his  poker,  and  the  sexton's  clock, 
mentioned  by  him  in  the  Sketch  Book,  are 
all  to  be  seen  —  if  your  lightning-express 
conductor  will  give  you  time  enough  to  see 
them.  From  the  Red  Horse  you  are  taken 
in  a  carriage,  when  you  ought  to  be  allowed 
to  proceed  on  foot,  and  the  usual  round 
includes  the  Shakespeare  Birthplace  ;  the 
Grammar  School  and  Guild  chapel ;  -the  re- 


134      HISTORIC    NOOKS   AND   CORNERS. 

mains  of  New  Place  ;  Trinity  church  and 
the  Shakespeare  graves  in  its  chancel ; 
Anne  Hathaway' s  cottage  at  Shottery ; 
and,  perhaps,  the  Shakespeare  Memorial 
library  and  theatre.  These  are  impressive 
sights  to  the  lover  of  Shakespeare ;  but 
when  you  have  seen  all  these  you  have  only 
begun  to  see  the  riches  of  Stratford-upon- 
Avon.  It  is  only  by  living  in  the  town,  by 
making  yourself  familiar  with  it  in  all  its 
moods,  by  viewing  it  in  storm  as  well  as  in 
sunshine,  by  roaming  through  its  quaint, 
deserted  streets  in  the  lonely  hours  of  the 
night,  by  sailing  up  and  down  its  beautiful 
Avon,  by  driving  and  walking  in  the  green 
lanes  that  twine  about  it  for  many  miles  in 
every  direction,  by  becoming  in  fact  a  part 
of  its  actual  being,  that  you  obtain  a  genu- 
ine knowledge  of  that  delightful  place. 
Familiarity,  in  this  case,  does  not  breed 
contempt.  The  worst  you  will  ever  learn 
of  Stratford  is  that  gossip  thrives  in  it ;  that 
its  intellect  is,  with  due  exception,  narrow 
and  sleepy  ;  and  that  it  is  heavily  ridden 
by  the  ecclesiastical  establishment.  You 
will  never  find  anything  that  can  detract 
from  the  impression  of  beauty  and  repose 
made  upon  your  mind  by  the  sweet  retire- 
ment of  its  situation,  by  the  majesty  of  its 


HISTORIC    NOOKS    AXD    CORNERS.       1 35 

venerable  monuments,  and  by  the  opulent,, 
diversified  splendours  of  its  natural  and 
historical  environment.  On  the  contrary, 
the  more  you  know  of  those  charms  the 
more  you  will  love  the  town,  and  the  greater 
will  be  the  benefit  of  high  thought  and  spir- 
itual exaltation  that  you  will  derive  from 
your  knowledge  of  it ;  and  hence  it  is  im- 
portant that  the  American  traveller  should 
be  counselled  for  his  own  sake  to  live  a 
little  while  in  Stratford  instead  of  treating 
it  as  an  incident  of  his  journey. 

The  occasion  of  a  garden  party  at  the 
rectory  of  a  clerical  friend  at  Butler's  Mars- 
ton  gave  opportunity  to  see  one  of  the 
many  picturesque  and  happy  homes  with 
which  this  region  abounds.  The  lawns 
there  are  ample  and  sumptuous.  The 
dwelling  and  the  church,  which  are  close  to 
each  other,  are  bowered  in  great  trees. 
From  the  terraces  a  lovely  view  may  be 
obtained  of  the  richly  coloured  and  finely 
cultivated  fields,  stretching  away  toward 
Edgehill,  which  lies  a  little  south-east  from 
Stratford-upon-Avon  about  sixteen  miles, 
and  marks  the  beginning  of  the  Vale  of  the 
Red  Horse.  In  the  churchyard  are  the 
gray,  lichen-covered  remains  of  one  of  those 
ancient  crosses  from  the  steps  of  which  the 


136     HISTORIC    NOOKS    AND    CORNERS. 

monks  preached  in  tlie  early  days  of  the 
church.  Relics  of  this  class  are  deeply  inter- 
esting for  what  they  suggest  of  the  people 
and  the  life  of  earlier  times.  A  perfect 
specimen  of  the  ancient  cross  may  be  seen 
at  Henley-in-Arden,  a  few  miles  north-west 
of  Stratford,  where  it  stands  in  mouldering 
majesty  at  the  junction  of  two  roads  in  the 
centre  of  the  village  —  strangely  inharmo- 
nious with  the  petty  shops  and  numerous 
inns  of  which  that  long  and  straggling  but 
characteristic  and  attractive  settlement  is 
composed.  The  tower  of  the  church  at 
Butler's  Marston,  a  gray,  grim  structure, 
"four-square  to  opposition,"  was  built  in 
the  eleventh  century  —  a  period  of  much 
ecclesiastical  activity  in  the  British  islands. 
Within  it  I  found  a  noble  pulpit  of  carved 
oak,  dark  with  age,  of  the  time  of  James 
I.  There  are  many  commemorative  stones 
in  the  church,  on  one  of  which  appears  this 
lovely  couplet,  addressed  to  the  shade  of  a 
young  girl :  — 

"  Sleep,  gentle  soul,   and  wait  thy  Maker's 
will! 
Then  rise  unchanged,  and  be  an  angel  still." 

The  present  village  of  Butler's  Marston 
—  a  little  group  of  cottages  clustered  upon 


HISTORIC    NOOKS    AND    CORNERS.       1 37 

the  margin  of  a  tiny  stream  and  almost  hid- 
den in  a  wooded  dell  —  is  comparatively- 
new  ;  for  it  has  arisen  since  the  time  of  the 
Puritan  civil  war.  The  old  village  was 
swept  away  by  the  Koundheads  when  Essex 
and  Hampden  came  down  to  fight  King 
Charles  at  Edgehill  in  1642.  That  fierce 
strife  waged  all  along  the  country-side,  and 
you  may  still  perceive  there,  in  the  inequali- 
ties of  the  land,  the  sites  on  which  houses 
formerly  stood.  It  is  a  sweet  and  peaceful 
place  now,  smiling  with  flowers  and  musical 
with  the  rustle  of  the  leaves  of  giant  elms. 
The  clergyman  farms  his  own  glebe,  and 
he  has  expended  more  than  a  thousand 
pounds  in  the  renovation  of  his  manse. 
The  church  "living"  is  not  worth  much 
more  than  a  hundred  pounds  a  year,  and 
when  he  leaves  the  dwelling,  if  he  should 
ever  leave  it,  he  loses  the  value  of  all  the 
improvements  that  he  has  made.  This  he 
mentioned  with  a  contented  smile.  The 
place,  in  fact,  is  a  little  paradise,  and  as  I 
looked  across  the  green  and  golden  fields, 
and  saw  the  herds  at  rest  and  the  wheat 
waving  in  sun  and  shadow,  and  thought 
of  the  simple  life  of  the  handful  of  people 
congregated  here,  the  words  of  Gray  came 
murmuring  into  my  mind :  — 


138      HISTORIC    NOOKS    AND   CORNERS. 

•'  Far  from  the  madding  crowd's  ignoble  strife 
Their  sober  wishes  never  learned  to  stray  ; 

Along  the  cool,  sequestered  vale  of  life 
They  kept  the  noiseless  tenor  of  their  way." 


Was  that  fine  line  suggested  to  Shake- 
speare by  the  spectacle  of  the  old  almshouse 
of  the  Guild,  which  stood  in  his  time,  just 
as  it  stands  now,  close  to  the  spot  where 
he  lived  and  died  ?  New  Place,  Shake- 
speare's home,  stood  on  the  northeast  cor- 
ner of  Chapel  Street  (a  continuation  of 
High  Street)  and  Chapel  Lane.  The  Guild 
chapel  stands  on  the  southeast  corner  of 
those  streets,  immediately  opposite  to  what 
was  once  the  poet's  home.  Southward 
from  the  chapel,  and  adjacent  to  it,  extends 
the  long,  low,  sombre  building  that  con- 
tains the  Free  Grammar  School  and  the 
almshouse,  founded  by  Thomas  Jolyffe  in 
1482,  and  refounded  in  1553  by  King  Ed- 
ward VI.  In  that  grammar  school  there  is 
reason  to  believe  that  Shakespeare  was  edu- 
cated ;  at  first  by  AValter  Roche,  afterward 
by  Simon  Hunt  —  who  doubtless  birched 
the  little  boys  then,  even  as  the  headmaster 
does  now ;  it  being  a  cardinal  principle 
with  the  British  educator  that  learning,  like 
other  goods,  should  be  delivered  in  the  rear. 


HISTORIC    NOOKS    AND    CORNERS.       1 39 

In  that  almshouse  doubtless  there  were 
many  forlorn  inmates,  even  as  there  are  at 
present  —  and  Shakespeare  must  often  have 
seen  them.  On  visitmg  one  of  the  bedes- 
men I  found  him  moving  slowly,  with  that 
mild,  aimless,  inert  manner  and  that  bleak 
aspect  peculiar  to  such  remnants  of  van- 
ishmg  life,  among  the  vegetable  vines  and 
the  profuse  and  rambling  flowers  in  the 
sunny  garden  behind  the  house  ;  and  pres- 
ently I  went  into  his  humble  room  and  sat 
by  his  fireside.  The  scene  was  the  perfect 
fulfilment  of  Shakespeare's  line.  A  stone 
floor.  A  low  ceiling  crossed  with  dusky 
beams.  Walls  that  had  been  whitewashed 
long  ago.  A  small  iron  kettle,  with  water 
in  it,  simmering  over  a  few  smouldering 
coals.  A  rough  bed,  in  a  corner.  A  little 
table,  on  which  were  three  conch-shells 
ranged  in  a  row.  An  old  arm-chair,  on 
which  were  a  few  coarse  wads  of  horsehair 
as  a  cushion.  A  bench,  whereon  lay  a  torn, 
tattered,  soiled  copy  of  the  XJrayer  book 
of  the  church  of  England,  beginning  at 
the  epiphany.  This  sumptuous  place  was 
lighted  by  a  lattice  of  small  leaded  panes. 
And  upon  one  of  the  walls  hung  a  framed 
placard  of  worsted  work,  bearing  the  in- 
scription, "Blessed  be  the  Lord  for   His 


140      HISTORIC    NOOKS    AND    CORNERS. 

Unspeakable  Gift."  The  aged,  infirm  pen- 
sioner doddered  about  the  room,  and  when 
lie  was  asked  what  had  become  of  his  wife 
his  dull  eyes  filled  with  tears  and  he  said 
simply  that  she  was  dead.  "So  runs  the 
world  away."  The  summons  surely  cannot 
be  unwelcome  that  calls  such  an  old  and 
lonely  pilgrim  as  that  to  his  rest  in  yonder 
churchyard  and  to  his  lost  wife  who  is  wait- 
ing for  him. 

Warwickshire  is  hallowed  hj  shining 
names  of  persons  illustrious  in  the  annals 
of  art.  Drayton,  Greene,  and  Heminge, 
who  belong  to  the  Shakespeare  period,  were 
born  there.  Walter  Savage  Landor  was  a 
native  of  Warwick  —  in  which  quaint  and 
charming  town  you  may  see  the  house  of  his 
birth,  duly  marked,  close  by  the  gate  of 
Warwick  Castle.  Croft,  the  composer,  was 
born  near  Ettington,  hard  by  Stratford: 
there  is  a  tiny  monument  commemorative 
of  him  in  the  ruins  of  Ettington  church, 
near  the  manor-house.  And  in  our  own 
day  Warwickshire  has  enriched  the  world 
with  George  Eliot  and  Ellen  Terry.  But  it 
is  a  chief  characteristic  of  England  that 
whichever  way  you  turn  in  it  your  foot- 
steps fall  on  haunted  ground.  Everyday 
life  there  is  continually  impressed  by  inci- 


HISTORIC   NOOKS   AND   CORNERS-       I4I 

dents  of  historic  association.  In  an  old 
church  at  Greenwich  I  asked  that  I  might 
be  directed  to  tlie  tomb  of  General  Wolfe. 
'•  He  is  buried  just  beneath  where  you  are 
now  standing,"  the  custodian  said.  It  was 
an  elderly  woman  who  showed  the  place, 
and  she  presently  stated  that  when  a  girl 
she  once  entered  the  vault  beneath  that 
church  and  stood  beside  the  coffin  of  General 
Wolfe  and  took  a  piece  of  laurel  from  it, 
and  also  took  a  piece  of  the  red  velvet  pall 
from  the  coffin  of  the  old  Duchess  of  Bolton, 
close  by.  That  Duchess  was  Lavinia  Fenton, 
the  first  representative  of  Polly,  in  Tlie  Beg- 
gars^ Opera,  who  died  in  1760,  aged  fifty- 
two.i  "Lord  Clive,"  the  dame  added, 
"  is  buried  in  the  same  vault."  An  im- 
pressive thought,  that  the  ashes  of  the  man 
who  established  Britain's  power  in  America 
should  at  last  mingle  with  the  ashes  of  the 
man  who  gave  India  to  England  ! 

1  Dr.  Joseph  Wharton,  in  a  letter  to  the  poet  Gay, 
described  her  as  follows:  "She  was  a  very  accom- 
plished and  most  agreeable  companion;  had  much 
wit,  good  strong  sense,  and  a  just  taste  in  polite 
literature.  Her  person  was  agreeable  and  well  made; 
though  I  think  she  could  never  be  called  a  beauty.  I 
have  had  the  pleasure  of  being  at  table  with  her  when 
her  conversation  was  much  admired  by  the  first  char- 
acters  of  the  age,  particularly  old  Lord  Bathurst  and 
Lord  Granville." 


142  SHAKESPEARE  S   TOWN. 


Shakespeare's  town. 

TO  traverse  Stratford-upon-Avon  is  to  re- 
turn upon  old  tracks,  but  no  matter 
how  often  you  visit  that  delightful  place 
you  will  always  see  new  sights  in  it  and 
find  new  incidents.  After  repeated  visits 
to  Shakespeare's  town  the  traveller  begins 
to  take  more  notice  than  perhaps  at  first  he 
did  of  its  everyday  life.  In  former  days 
the  observer  had  no  eyes  except  for  the 
Shakespeare  shrines.  The  addition  of  a 
new  wing  to  the  ancient  Red  Horse,  the 
new  gardens  around  the  Memorial  theatre, 
the  new  chimes  of  Trinity  —  these,  and 
matters  like  to  these,  attract  attention 
now.  And  now,  too,  I  have  rambled,  in 
the  gloaming,  through  scented  fields  to 
Clifford  church  ;  and  strolled  through 
many  a  green  lane  to  beautiful  Preston; 
and  climbed  Borden  hill ;  and  stood  by  the 
maypole  on  Welford  common  ;  and  jour- 
neyed along    the  battle-haunted   crest   of 


1 

f. 

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r 

!►'  j: 

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n 
n: 


Shakespeare's  town.  143 

Edgehill ;  and  rested  at  venerable  Compton- 
Winyate ;  and  climbed  the  hills  of  Wel- 
combe  to  peer  into  the  darkening  valleys  of 
the  Avon  and  hear  the  cuckoo-note  echoed 
and  re-echoed  from  rhododendron  groves, 
and  from  the  great,  mysterious  elms  that 
embower  this  country-side  for  miles  and 
miles  around.  This  is  the  life  of  Stratford 
to-day  —  the  fertile  farms,  the  garnished 
meadows,  the  avenues  of  white  and  coral 
hawthorn,  masses  of  milky  snow  -  ball, 
honeysuckle,  and  syringa  loading  the  soft 
air  with  fragrance,  chestnuts  dropping 
blooms  of  pink  and  white,  and  laburnums 
swinging  their  golden  censers  in  the  breeze. 
The  building  that  forms  the  southeast 
corner  of  High  Street  and  Bridge  Street  in 
Stratford  was  occupied  in  Shakespeare's 
time  by  Thomas  Quiney,  a  wine-dealer, 
who  married  the  poet's  youngest  daughter, 
Judith,  and  an  inscription  appears  upon  it, 
stating  that  Judith  lived  in  it  for  thirty-six 
years.  Richard  Savage,  that  competent, 
patient,  diligent  student  of  the  church  reg- 
isters and  other  documentary  treasures  of 
Warwickshire,  furnished  the  proof  of  this 
fact  from  investigation  of  the  town  records 
—  which  is  but  one  of  many  services  that 
he  has  rendered  to  the  old  home  of  Shake- 


144  SHAKESPEARE  S    TOWN. 

speare.  The  Quiney  premises  are  now  occu- 
pied by  Edward  Fox,  a  journalist,  a  printer, 
and  a  dealer  in  souvenirs  of  Shakespeare 
and  of  Stratford.  This  house,  in  old  times, 
was  officially  styled  The  Cage,  because  it 
had  been  used  as  a  prison.  Standing  in 
the  cellar  of  it  you  perceive  that  its  walls 
are  four  feet  thick.  There  likewise  are  seen 
traces  of  the  grooves  down  which  the  wine- 
casks  were  rolled  in  the  days  of  Shake- 
speare's son-in-law,  Thomas  Quiney.  The 
shop  now  owned  by  Edward  Fox  has  been 
established  in  Stratford  more  than  a  hun- 
dred years,  and  as  this  tenant  has  a  long 
lease  of  the  building  and  is  of  an  energetic 
spirit  in  his  business  it  bids  fair  to  last  as 
much  longer.  One  indication  of  his  sagacity 
was  revealed  in  the  cellar,  where  was  heaped 
a  quantity  of  old  oak,  taken,  in  1887,  from 
the  belfry  of  Trinity  church,  in  which 
Shakespeare  is  buried.  This  oak,  which 
was  there  when  Shakespeare  lived,  and 
which  had  to  be  removed  because  a  stronger 
structure  was  required  for  sustaining  an 
augmented  chime  of  heavy  bells,  will  be 
converted  into  various  carved  relics,  such 
as  must  find  favour  with  vShakespeare  wor- 
shippers —  of  whom  more  than  sixteen  thou- 
sand visited  Stratford  in  1887,  at  least  one- 


Shakespeare's  town.  145 

fourth  of  that  number,  4482,  being  Ameri- 
cans. A  cross  made  of  the  belfry  wood  is 
a  pleasmg  souvenir  of  the  hallowed  Shake- 
speare church.  When  the  poet  saw  that 
church  the  tower  was  surmounted,  not  as 
now  witli  a  tall  and  graceful  stone  spire, 
but  with  a  spire  of  timber  covered  with 
lead.  This  was  removed  and  was  replaced 
by  the  stone  spire  in  1763.  The  oak  frame 
to  support  the  bells,  however,  has  been  in 
the  tower  more  than  three  hundred  years. 

The  two  sculptured  groups,  emblematic 
of  Comedy  and  Tragedy,  which  have  been 
placed  upon  the  front  of  the  Shakespeare 
Memorial  theatre,  are  the  gain  of  a  benefit 
performance,  given  in  that  building  on  Au- 
gust 29,  1885,  by  Mary  Anderson,  who  then, 
for  the  first  time  in  her  life,  impersonated 
Shakespeare's  Rosalind.  That  actress,  after 
her  first  visit  to  Stratford  —  a  private  visit 
made  in  1883  —  manifested  a  deep  interest 
in  the  town,  and  in  consequence  of  her  ser- 
vices to  the  Shakespeare  Memorial  she  is 
now  one  of  its  life-governors.  Those  ser- 
vices completed  the  exterior  decorations  of 
the  building.  The  emblem  of  History  had 
already  been  put  in  its  place  —  the  scene  in 
King  John  in  which  Prince  Arthur  melts 
the  cruel  purpose  of  Hubert  to  burn  out  his 

K 


146  SHAKESPEARE'S    TOWN. 

eyes.  Tragedy  is  represented  by  Hamlet 
and  the  Gravedigger  in  their  colloquy  over 
Yorick's  skull.  In  the  emblem  of  Comedy 
the  figure  of  Rosalind  is  that  of  Mary 
Anderson,  in  a  boy's  dress  —  a  figure  that 
may  be  deemed  inadequate  to  the  original 
but  one  that  certainly  is  expressive  of  the 
ingenuous  demeanour  and  artless  grace  of 
that  gentle  lady.  The  grounds  south  of  the 
Memorial  are  diversified  and  adorned  with 
lawns,  trees,  flowers,  and  commodious  path- 
ways, and  that  lovely,  park-like  enclosure  — 
thus  beautified  through  the  liberality  of 
Charles  Edward  Flower,  the  original  pro- 
moter of  the  Memorial  —  is  now  free  to  the 
people,  "to  walk  abroad  and  recreate  them- 
selves "  beside  the  Avon.  The  picture 
gallery  of  the  Memorial  lacks  many  things 
that  are  needed,  and  it  contains  several 
things  that  it  should  lack.  The  library 
continues  to  grow,  but  the  American  de- 
partment of  it  needs  accessions.  Every 
American  edition  of  Shakespeare  ought  to 
be  there,  and  every  book,  of  American 
origin,  on  a  Shakespeare  subject.  It  was 
at  one  time  purposed  to  set  up  a  special 
case,  surmounted  with  the  American  em- 
blem, for  the  reception  of  contributions 
from  Americans.    The  library  contained,  in 


SHAKESPEARE  S    TOWN.  1 4/ 

March  1890,  five  thousand  seven  hundred 
and  ninety  volumes,  in  various  languages. 
Of  English  editions  of  the  complete  works 
of  Shakespeare  it  contains  two  hundred 
and  nine.  A  Eussian  translation  of  Shake- 
speare, in  nine  volumes,  appears  in  the 
collection,  together  with  three  complete 
editions  in  Dutch.  An  elaborate  and  beau- 
tiful catalogue  of  those  treasures,  made  by- 
Mr.  Frederic  Hawley,  records  them  in  an 
imperishable  form.  Mr.  Hawley,  long  the 
librarian  of  the  Memorial,  died  at  Stratford 
on  March  13,  1889,  aged  sixty-two,  and  was 
buried  at  Kensal  Green,  in  London,  his  wish 
being  to  rest  in  that  place.  Mr.  Hawley  had 
been  an  actor,  under  the  name  of  Hay  well, 
and  he  was  the  author  of  more  than  one 
tragedy  in  blank  verse.  Mr,  A.  H.  Wall, 
who  succeeded  him  as  librarian,  is  a 
learned  man,  an  antiquary,  and  an  excel- 
lent writer.  To  him  the  readers  of  the 
Stratford-upon-Avon  Herald  are  indebted 
for  many  instructive  articles  —  notably  for 
those  giving  an  account  of  the  original 
Shakespeare  quartos  acquired  for  the  Me- 
morial Library  at  the  sale  of  the  literary 
property  of  J.  O.  Halliwell-rhillipps.  Those 
quartos  are  the  Merchant  of  Venice^  the 
Merry  Wives  of  Windsor^  and  a  first  edition 


148  Shakespeare's  town. 

of  Pericles.  A  copy  of  Roger  of  Faversham 
was  also  bought,  together  with  two  of  the 
plays  of  Aphra  Behn.  Charles  Edward 
Flower  purchased  at  that  sale  a  copy  of 
the  first  folio  of  Shakespeare,  and  all  four 
of  the  Shakespeare  Folios  (1623,  1632, 
1663,  1685)  now  stand  side  by  side  in  his 
private  library  at  Avonbank.  Mr,  Flower 
intimated  the  intention  of  giving  them  to 
the  Memorial  library.  [His  death,  May  3, 
1892,  will  not  defeat  that  purpose.] 

A  large  collection  of  old  writings  was 
found  in  a  room  of  the  Grammar  School, 
adjacent  to  the  Guild  chapel,  in  1887. 
About  five  thousand  separate  papers  were 
discovered,  the  old  commingled  with  the 
new ;  many  of  them  indentures  of  appren- 
ticeship ;  many  of  them  receipts  for  money; 
no  one  of  them  especially  important  as 
bearing  on  the  Shakespeare  story.  Several 
of  them  are  in  Latin.  The  earliest  date  is 
1560  —  four  years  before  the  poet  was  born. 
One  document  is  a  memorandum  "present- 
ing" a  couple  of  the  wives  of  Stratford  for 
slander  of  certain  other  women,  and  quot- 
ing their  bad  language  with  startling  fidel- 
ity. Another  is  a  letter  from  a  citizen  of 
London,  named  Smart,  establishing  and 
endowing  a  free  school  in   Stratford   for 


SHAKESPEARE'S   TOWN.  I49 

teaching  English  —  the  writer  quaintly  re- 
marking that  schools  for  the  teaching  of 
Latin  are  numerous,  while  no  school  for 
teaching  English  exists,  that  he  can  dis- 
cover. Those  papers  have  been  classified 
and  arranged  by  Richard  Savage,  but  noth- 
ing directly  pertinent  to  Shakespeare  has 
been  found  in  them.  I  saw  a  deed  that 
bore  the  "mark"  of  Joan,  sister  of  Mary 
Arden,  Shakespeare's  motlier,  but  this  may 
not  be  a  recent  discovery.  All  those  papers 
are  written  in  that  "  cramped  penmanship" 
which  baffled  Tony  Lumpkin  —  and  which 
baffles  wiser  people  than  he  was.  Richard 
Savage,  however,  is  skilful  in  reading  this 
crooked  and  queer  caligraphy ;  and  the 
materials  and  the  duty  of  exploring  them 
are  in  the  right  hands.  When  the  re- 
searches and  conclusions  of  that  scholar  are 
published  they  will  augment  the  mass  of 
evidence  already  extant  —  much  of  it  well 
presented  by  J.  O.  Halliwell-Phillipps  —  that 
the  writer  of  Shakespeare's  plays  ^  was  a 
man  familiar  with  the  neighbourhood,  the 
names,  and  the  everyday  life  of  Stratford- 
upon-Avon  ;  a  fact  which  is  not  without  its 

1  A  cogent  paper  on  this  subject,  the  learned  and 
logical  work  of  John  Taylor,  Esq.,  may  be  found  in 
the  London  Athenceum,  February  9, 1889. 


150  Shakespeare's  town. 

admonitory  suggestiveness  to  those  credu- 
lous persons  who  incline  to  heed  the  igno- 
rant and  idle  theories  and  conjectures  of 
Mr.  Ignatius  Donnelly.  That  dense  person 
visited  Shakespeare's  town  in  the  summer 
of  1888,  and  surveyed  the  scenes  that  are 
usually  viewed,  and  was  entertained  by  the 
vicar,  the  Rev.  George  Arbuthnot ;  but  he 
attracted  no  attention  other  than  the  con- 
tempt he  deserves.  "He  did  not  address 
himself  to  me,"  said  Miss  Chataway,  who 
was  then  at  the  Birthplace,  as  its  custodian  ; 
"had  he  done  so  I  should  have  informed 
him  that,  in  Stratford,  Bacon  is  all  gam- 
mon." She  was  right.  So  it  is.  And  not 
alone  in  Stratford,  but  wherever  men  and 
women  have  eyes  to  see  and  brains  to 
understand. 

The  spot  on  which  Shakespeare  died 
ought  surely  to  be  deemed  as  sacred  as  the 
spot  on  which  he  was  born  :  yet  New  Place 
is  not  as  much  visited  as  the  Birthplace  — 
perhaps  because  so  little  of  it  remains. 
Only  five  hundred  and  thirty-seven  visitors 
went  there  during  the  year  ending  April  13, 
1888.  In  repairing  the  custodian's  house 
at  New  Place  the  crossed  timbers  in  the 
one  remaining  fragment  of  the  north  wall 
pf  the  original  structure  were  found,  be- 


SHAKESPEARE  S    TOWN.  I5I 

neatli  plaster.  Those  have  been  left  un- 
covered and  their  dark  lines  add  to  the 
picturesque  effect  of  the  place.  The  aspect 
of  the  old  house  prior  to  1742  is  known  but 
vaguely,  if  at  all.  Shakespeare  bought  it 
in  1597,  when  he  was  thirty-three  years  old, 
and  he  kept  it  till  his  death,  nineteen  years 
later.  The  street  —  Chapel  lane  —  that  sep- 
arates it  from  the  Guild  chapel  was  nar- 
rower than  it  is  now,  and  the  house  stood 
in  a  grassy  enclosure,  encircled  by  a  wall, 
the  entrance  to  the  garden  being  at  some 
distance  eastward  down  lue  lane,  toward 
the  river.  The  chief  rooms  in  New  Place 
were  lined  with  square,  sunken  panels  of 
oak,  which  covered  the  walls  from  floor  to 
roof  and  probably  formed  the  ceilings. 
Some  of  those  panels  —  obtained  when  the 
Rev.  Francis  Gastrell  tore  down  that  house 
in  1759  —  may  be  seen  in  a  parlour  of  the 
Falcon  Hotel.  There  is  nothing  left  of  New 
Place  but  the  old  well  in  the  cellar,  the 
fragments  of  the  foundation,  the  lintel,  the 
armorial  stone,  and  the  fragment  of  wall 
that  forms  part  of  the  custodian's  house. 
That  custodian,  Mr.  Bower  Bulmer,  a  pleas- 
ant, appreciative  man,  always  attentive 
and  genial,  died  on  January  17,  1888,  and 
his  widow  succeeded  him  in  office.     An- 


152  SHAKESPEARE  S    TOWN. 

Other  conspicuous  and  interesting  Stratford 
figure,  well  known,  and  for  a  long  time, 
was  John  Marshall,  the  antiquary,  who 
died  on  June  25,  1887.  Mr.  Marshall  occu- 
pied the  building  next  but  one  to  the  origi- 
nal New  Place,  on  the  north  side,  —  the 
house  once  tenanted  by  Julius  Shaw,  one 
of  the  five  witnesses  to  Shakespeare's  will. 
Mr.  Marshall  sold  Shakespeare  souvenirs 
and  quaint  furniture.  He  had  remarkable 
skill  in  carving  and  his  mind  was  full  of 
knowledge  of  Shakespeare  antiquities  and 
the  traditional  lore  of  Stratford.  His  kind- 
ness, his  eccentric  ways,  his  elaborate 
forms  of  speech,  and  his  love  and  faculty 
for  art  commended  him  to  the  respect  and 
sympathy  of  all  who  really  knew  him.  He 
was  a  character — and  in  such  a  place  as 
Stratford  such  quaint  beings  are  appro- 
priate and  uncommonly  delightful.  He 
will  long  be  kindly  remembered,  long 
missed  from  his  accustomed  round.  He 
rests  now  in  an  unmarked  grave  in  Trinity 
churchyard,  close  to  the  bank  of  the  Avon 
—  just  in  front  of  the  stone  that  marks  the 
sepulchre  of  Mary  Pickering ;  by  which 
token  the  future  pilgrim  may  know  the 
spot.  Marshall  was  well  known  to  me, 
and  we  had  many  a  talk  about  the  antiqui- 


SHAKESPEARE  S    TOWN.  I  53 

ties  of  the  town.  Among  my  relics  there 
is  a  precious  piece  of  wood  bearing  this  in- 
scription, written  by  him  :  "  Old  Oak  from 
Shakespeare's  Birth-place,  taken  out  of  the 
building  when  it  was  Restored  in  1858  by 
Mr.  William  Holtom,  the  contractor  for  the 
restoration,  who  supplied  it  to  John  Mar- 
shall, carver,  Stratford -on- Avon,  and  pre- 
sented by  him  to  W.  Winter,  August  27th, 
1885,  J.  M."  Another  valued  souvenir  of 
this'  quaint  person,  given  by  his  widow  to 
Richard  Savage,  of  the  Birthplace  —  a  fine 
carved  goblet,  made  from  the  wood  of  the 
renowned  mulberry-tree  planted  by  the 
poet  in  the  garden  of  New  I'lace,  and  cut 
down  by  the  Rev.  Francis  Gastrell  in  1756 
—  came  into  my  possession,  as  a  birthday 
gift,  on  July  15,  1891. 

At  the  Shakespeare  Birthplace  you  will 
no  longer  meet  with  those  gentle  ladies  — 
so  quaint,  so  characteristic,  so  harmonious 
with  the  place  —  Miss  Maria  Chataway  and 
Miss  Caroline  Chataway.  The  former  of 
these  was  the  official  custodian  of  the  cot- 
tage, and  the  latter  assisted  her  in  the  work 
of  its  exposition.  They  retired  from  office 
in  June  1889,  after  seventeen  years  of  ser- 
vice, the  former  aged  seventy-eight,  the  lat- 
ter seventy-six  J  and  now  —  being  infirm, 


154  SHAKESPEARE'S    TOWN. 

and  incapable  of  tlie  active,  incessant  labour 
that  was  required  of  them  by  the  multitude 
of  visitors  —  they  dwell  in  a  little  house  in 
the  Warwick  Eoad,  where  their  friends  are 
welcomed,  and  where  venerable  and  hon- 
oured age  will  henceforth  haunt  the  chim- 
ney-corner, and  "keep  the  flame  from 
wasting  by  repose."  i  The  new  guardian 
of  the  Shakespeare  Cottage  is  Joseph  Skip- 
sey,2  of  Newcastle,  the  miner  poet:  for 
Mr.  Skipsey  was  trained  in  the  mines  of 
Northumberland,  was  long  a  labourer  in 
them,  and  his  muse  sings  in  the  simple  ac- 
cents of  nature.  He  is  the  author  of  an 
essay  on  Burns,  and  of  various  other  essays 
and  miscellaneous  writings.  An  edition  of 
his  poems,  under  the  title  of  Carols., 
Songs  and  Ballads  has  been  published  in 
London,  by  Walter  Scott,  and  that  book 
will  be  found  interesting  by  those  who  en- 
joy the  study  of  original  character  and  of  a 
rhythmical  expression  that  does  not  savour 
of  the  poetical  schools.  Mr.  Skipsey  is  an 
elderly  man,  with  grizzled  hair,  a  benevo- 
lent countenance,  and  a  simple,  cordial 
manner.     He  spoke  to  me,  with  much  ani- 

1  Miss  Maria  Chataway  died  on  January  31,  1891. 

2  Mr.  Skipsey  resigned  his  position  in  October 
1891. 


SHAKESPEARE'S    TOWN.  1 55 

mation,  about  American  poets,  and  espe- 
cially about  Richard  Henry  Stoddard,  in 
whose  rare  and  fine  genius  he  manifested  a 
deep,  thoughtful,  and  gratifying  interest. 
The  visitor  no  longer  hears  that  earnest, 
formal,  characteristic  recital,  descriptive  of 
the  house,  that  was  given  daily  and  re- 
peatedly for  so  many  years  by  Miss  Caro- 
line Chataway,  —  that  delightful  allusion  to 
"the  mighty  dome"  that  was  the  "fit 
place  for  the  mighty  brain."  The  Birth- 
place acquires  new  treasures  from  year  to 
year  —  mainly  in  its  library,  which  is  kept 
in  perfect  order  by  Eichard  Savage,  that 
ideal  antiquarian,  who  even  collects  and 
retains  the  bits  of  the  stone  floor  of  the 
Shakespeare  room  that  become  detached  by 
age.  In  that  library  is  preserved  the  origi- 
nal manuscript  of  Wheler's  History  of 
Stratford,  together  with  his  own  annotated 
and  interleaved  copy  of  the  printed  book, 
which  is  thus  enriched  with  much  new 
material  relative  to  the  antiquities  of  the 
storied  town. 

In  the  AVashington  Irving  parlour  of  the 
Red  Horse  the  American  traveller  will 
find  objects  that  are  specially  calculated  to 
please  his  fancy  and  to  deepen  his  interest 
in  the  place.    Among  these  are  the  chair  in 


156  Shakespeare's  town. 

which  Irving  sat;  the  sexton's  clock  to 
which  he  refers  in  tlie  Sketch  Book;  an 
autograpli  letter  by  him  ;  another  by  Long- 
fellow; a  view  of  Irving' s  house  of  Sunny- 
side  ;  and  pictures  of  Junius  Booth,  Edwin 
Booth,  the  elder  and  the  present  Jefferson, 
Mary  Anderson,  Ada  Rehan,  Elliston,  Far- 
ren,  Salvini,  Henry  Irving,  and  Ellen  Terry. 
To  invMt  that  valued  room  with  an  atmos- 
phere at  once  literary  and  dramatic  was  the 
intention  of  its  decorator,  and  this  object 
has  been  attained.  When  Washington  Ir- 
ving visited  Stratford  and  lodged  at  the  Red 
Horse  the  "pretty  chambermaid,"  to  whom 
he  alludes,  in  his  gentle  and  genial  account 
of  that  experience,  was  Sally  Garner  —  then 
in  fact  a  middle-aged  woman  and  plain 
rather  than  pretty.  The  head  waiter  was 
William  Webb.  Both  those  persons  lived 
to  an  advanced  age.  Sally  Garner  was  re- 
tired, on  a  pension,  by  the  late  Mr.  Gard- 
ner, former  proprietor  of  the  Red  Horse, 
and  she  died  at  Tanworth  and  was  buried 
there.  Webb  died  at  Stratford.  He  had 
been  a  waiter  at  the  Red  Horse  for  sixty 
years,  and  he  was  esteemed  by  all  who 
knew  him.  His  grave,  in  Stratford  church- 
yard, remained  unmarked,  and  it  is  one 
among  the   many  that  were  levelled  and 


SHAKESPEARE  S   TOWN.  1 57 

obliterated  in  1888,  by  order  of  the  pres- 
ent vicar.  A  few  of  the  older  residents 
of  the  town  might  perhaps  be  able  to  indi- 
cate its  situation  ;  but,  practically,  that  relic 
of  the  past  is  gone  —  and  with  it  has  van- 
ished an  element  of  valuable  interest  to  the 
annual  multitude  of  Shakespeare  pilgrims 
upon  whom  the  prosperity  of  Stratford  is 
largely  dependent,  and  for  whom,  if  not  for 
the  inhabitants,  every  relic  of  its  past  should 
be  perpetuated.  This  sentiment  is  not  with- 
out its  practical  influence.  Among  other 
good  results  of  it  is  the  restoration  of  the 
ancient  timber  front  and  the  quaint  gables 
of  the  Shakespeare  hotel,  which,  already 
hallowed  by  its  association  with  Garrick 
and  the  Jubilee  of  September  7,  1769,  has 
now  become  one  of  the  most  picturesque, 
attractive,  and  representative  buildings  in 
Stratford. 

There  is  a  resolute  disposition  among 
Stratford  people  to  save  and  perpetuate 
everything  that  is  associated,  however  re- 
motely, with  the  name  of  Shakespeare, 
Mr.  C.  F.  Loggin,  a  chemist  in  the  High 
Street,  possesses  a  lock  and  key  that  were 
affixed  to  one  of  the  doors  in  New  Place, 
and  also  a  sundial  that  reposed  upon  a 
pedestal  in  New  Place  garden,  presumably 


158  Shakespeare's  town. 

in  Shakespeare's  time.  The  lock  is  made  of 
brass  ;  tlie  key  of  iron,  with  an  ornamented 
handle,  of  graceful  design,  but  broken.  On 
the  lock  appears  an  inscription  stating  that 
it  was  ' '  taken  from  New  Place  in  the  year 
1759,  and  preserved  by  John  Lord,  Esq." 
The  sundial  is  made  of  copper,  and  upon 
its  surface  are  Roman  numerals  distributed 
around  the  outer  edge  of  the  circle  that  en- 
closes its  rays.  The  corners  of  the  plate 
are  broken,  and  one  side  of  it  is  bent.  This 
injury  was  done  to  it  by  thieves,  who 
wrenched  it  from  its  setting,  on  a  night  in 
1759,  and  were  just  making  away  with  it 
when  they  were  captured  and  deprived  of 
their  plunder.  The  sundial  also  bears  an 
inscription,  certifying  that  it  was  preserved 
by  Mr.  Lord.  New  Place  garden  was  at 
one  time  owned  by  one  of  Mr.  Loggin's 
relatives,  and  from  that  former  owner  those 
Shakespeare  relics  were  derived.  Shake- 
speare's hand  may  have  touched  that  lock, 
and  Shakespeare's  eyes  may  have  looked 
upon  that  dial  —  perhaps  on  the  day  when 
he  made  Jaques  draw  the  immortal  picture 
of  Touchstone  in  the  forest,  moralising  on 
the  flight  of  time  and  the  evanescence  of 
earthly  things.  As  You  Like  It  was  written 
in  1599. 


SHAKESPEARE 'is    TOWN.  1 59 

Another  remote  relic  of  Shakespeare  is 
the  shape  of  the  foundation  of  Bishopton 
church,  which  remains  distinctly  traced,  by- 
ridges  of  the  velvet  sod,  in  a  green  field  a 
little  to  the  northwest  of  Stratford,  in  the 
direction  of  AVilmcote  —  the  birthplace  of 
Shakespeare's  mother,  Mary  Arden.  The 
parish  of  Bishopton  adjoins  that  of  Shottery, 
and  Bishopton  is  one  of  the  three  places 
mentioned  in  association  with  Shakespeare's 
marriage  with  Anne  Hathaway.  Many 
scholars,  indeed,  incline  to  think  that  the 
wedding  occurred  there.  The  church  was 
demolished  about  eighty  years  ago.  The 
house  in  Wilmcote,  in  which,  as  tradition 
declares,  Mary  Arden  was  born,  is  seen  at 
the  entrance  to  the  village,  and  is  conspicu- 
ous for  its  quaint  dormer  windows  and  for 
its  mellow  colours  and  impressive  antiquity. 
Wilmcote  is  rougher  in  aspect  than  most 
of  the  villages  of  Warwickshire,  and  the 
country  immediately  around  it  is  wild  and 
bleak;  but  the  hedges  are  full  of  wild- 
flowers  and  are  haunted  by  many  birds ; 
and  the  wide,  green,  lonesome  fields,  espe- 
cially when  you  see  them  in  the  gloaming, 
possess  that  air  of  melancholy  solitude  — 
vague,  dream-like,  and  poetic  rather  than 
sad  —  which    always    strongly   sways    the 


i6o  Shakespeare's  town. 

imaginative  mind.  Inside  tlie  Mary  Arden 
Cottage  I  saw  nothing  remarkable  except 
tlie  massive  old  timbers.  That  house  as 
well  as  the  Anne  Hathaway  cottage  at 
Shottery,  will  be  purchased  and  added  to 
"  the  Amalgamated  Trusts  of  Shakespeare's 
Birthplace,  the  Museum,  and  New  Place." 
The  Anne  Hathaway  cottage  is  falling  into 
decay ;  it  needs  care ;  and  as  an  authentic 
relic  of  Shakespeare  and  a  charming  bit  of 
rustic  antiquity  its  preservation  is  impor- 
tant, as  well  to  lovers  of  the  poet,  all  the 
world  over,  as  to  the  town  of  Stratford, 
which  thrives  by  his  renown.  The  beauti- 
ful Guild  chapel  also  needs  care.  The 
hand  of  restoration  should,  indeed,  touch 
it  lightly  and  reverently;  but  restored  it 
must  be,  at  no  distant  day,  for  every  au- 
tumn storm  shakes  down  fragments  of  its 
fretted  masonry  and  despoils  the  venerable 
grandeur  of  that  gray  tower  on  which  Shake- 
speare so  often  gazed  from  the  windows 
of  his  hallowed  home.  Whatever  is  done 
there,  fortunately  for  the  Shakespearean 
world,  will  be  done  under  the  direction  of 
a  man  of  noble  spirit,  rare  ability,  sound 
scholarship,  and  fine  taste  —  the  Rev.  R.  S. 
De  Courcy  Laffan,  headmaster  of  the  Gram- 
mar School  and  therefore  pastor  of   the 


SHAKESPEARE'S    TOWN.  l6l 

Guild.  Liberal  in  thought,  manly  in  char- 
acter, simple,  sincere,  and  full  of  sensibility 
and  goodness,  that  preacher  strongly  im- 
presses all  who  approach  him,  and  is  one 
of  the  most  imposing  figures  in  the  pulpit 
of  his  time.  And  he  is  a  reverent  Shake- 
spearean. 

A  modern  feature  of  Stratford,  interest- 
ing to  the  Shakespeare  pilgrim,  is  Lord 
Ronald  Gower's  statue  of  the  poet,  erected 
in  October  1888,  in  the  Memorial  garden. 
That  work  is  infelicitous  in  its  site  and  not 
fortunate  in  all  of  its  details,  but  in  some 
particulars  it  is  fine.  It  consists  of  a  huge 
pedestal,  on  the  top  of  which  is  the  full- 
length  bronze  figure  of  Shakespeare,  seated 
in  a  chair,  while  at  the  four  corners  of  the 
base  are  bronze  effigies  of  Hamlet,  Lady 
Macbeth,  Henry  V.,  and  Falstaff.  Hamlet 
is  the  expression  of  a  noble  ideal.  The 
face  and  figure  are  wasted  with  misery,  yet 
full  of  thought  and  strength.  The  type  of 
man  thus  embodied  will  at  once  be  rec- 
ognised—  an  imperial,  powerful,  tender, 
gracious,  but  darkly  introspective  nature, 
broken  and  subjugated  by  hopeless  grief 
and  by  vain  brooding  over  the  mystery  of 
life  and  death.  Lady  Macbeth  is  depicted 
in  her  sleep-walking,   and,   although    the 

L. 


1 62  Shakespeare's  town. 

figure  is  treated  in  a  conventional  manner, 
it  conveys  the  idea  of  remorse  and  of  phy- 
sical emaciation  from  suffering,  and  like- 
wise the  sense  of  being  haunted  and  ac- 
cursed. Prince  Henry  is  represented  as 
he  may  have  appeared  when  putting  on  his 
dying  father's  kingly  crown.  The  figure 
is  lithe,  graceful,  and  spirited  ;  the  pose  is 
true  and  the  action  is  natural ;  but  the 
personality  is  deficient  of  identity  and  of 
royal  distinction.  Falstaff  appears  as  a  fat 
man  who  is  a  type  of  gross,  chuckling 
humour ;  so  that  this  image  might  stand  for 
Gambrinus.  The  intellect  and  the  predom- 
inant character  of  Ealstaff  are  not  indicated. 
The  figures  are  dwarfed,  furthermore,  by 
the  size  of  the  stone  that  they  surround 
—  a  huge  pillar,  upon  which  appropriate 
lines  from  Shakespeare  have  been  inscribed. 
The  statue  of  Shakespeare  shows  a  man  of 
solid  self- concentration  and  adamantine 
will ;  an  observer  of  universal  view  and 
incessant  vigilance.  The  chief  feature  of  it 
is  the  piercing  look  of  the  eyes.  This  is  a 
man  who  sees,  ponders,  and  records.  Im- 
agination and  sensibility,  on  the  other  hand, 
are  not  suggested.  The  face  lacks  model- 
ling :  II  is  as  smootn  as  the  face  of  a  child  ; 
there  is  not  one  characteristic    curve  or 


SHAKESPEARE'S    TOWN.  1 63 

wrinkle  in  all  its  placid  expanse.  Perhaps 
it  was  designed  to  express  an  idea  of  eternal 
youth.  The  man  who  had  gained  Shake- 
speare's obvious  experience  must  have  risen 
to  a  composure  not  to  be  ruffled  by  any- 
thing that  this  world  can  do  to  bless  or  to 
ban  a  human  life.  But  the  record  of  his 
struggle  must  have  been  written  in  his 
face.  This  may  be  a  fine  statue  of  a  prac- 
tical thinker,  but  it  is  not  the  image  of  a 
poet  and  it  is  not  an  adequate  presentment 
of  Shakespeare.  The  structure  stands  on 
the  south  side  of  the  Memorial  building 
and  within  a  few  feet  of  it,  so  that  it  is 
almost  swallowed  up  by  what  was  intended 
for  its  background.  It  would  show  to  bet- 
ter advantage  if  it  were  placed  further  to 
the  south,  looking  down  the  long  reach  of 
the  Avon  toward  Shakespeare's  church.  The 
form  of  the  poet  could  then  be  seen  from 
the  spot  on  which  he  died,  while  his  face 
would  still  look,  as  it  does  now,  toward  his 
tomb. 

A  constant  stream  of  American  visitors 
pours  annually  through  the  Red  Horse. 
Within  three  days  of  July  1889  more  than 
a  hundred  American  names  appeared  in  the 
register.  The  spirit  of  Washington  Irving 
is  mighty  yet.     Looking  through  a  few  of 


t64  SHAKESPEARE'S    TOWN. 

the  old  registers  of  this  house,  I  came 
upon  many  familiar  names  of  distinguished 
Americans.  Bayard  Taylor  came  here  on 
July  23,  1856 ;  James  E.  Murdoch  (the 
famous  Hamlet  and  Mirabel  of  other  days) 
on  August  31,  1856 ;  Rev.  Francis  Vinton 
on  June  10,  1857  ;  Henry  Ward  Beecher  on 
June  22,  1862  ;  Elihu  Burritt,  "  the  learned 
blacksmith,"  on  September  19,  1865; 
George  Ripley  on  May  12,  1866.  Poor 
Artemas  Ward  arrived  on  September  18, 
1866  —  only  a  little  while  before  his  death, 
which  occurred  in  March  1867,  at  South- 
ampton. The  Rev.  Charles  T.  Brooks, 
translator  of  Faust,  registered  his  name 
here  on  September  20,  1866.  Charles  Dud- 
ley AVarner  came  on  May  6,  1868  ;  Mr.  and 
Mrs.  W.  J.  Florence  on  May  29,  1868  ;  and 
S.  R.  Gifford  and  Jervis  M'Entee  on  the 
same  day.  The  poet  Longfellow,  accom- 
panied by  Tom  Appleton,  arrived  on  June 
23,  1868.  Those  Red  Horse  registers  con- 
tain a  unique  and  remarkable  collection  of 
autographs.  Within  a  few  pages,  I  ob- 
served the  curiously  contrasted  signatures 
of  Cardinal  Wiseman,  Sam  Cowell,  the  Due 
d'Aumale,  Tom  Thumb,  Miss  Burdett- 
Coutts  (1861),  Blanchard  Jerrold,  Edmund 
Yates,  Charles  Fechter,  Andrew  Carnegie, 


Shakespeare's  town.  165 

David  Gray  (of  Buffalo),  the  Duchess  of 
Coburg,  Moses  H.  Grinnell,  Lord  Leigh,  of 
Stoneleigh  Abbey,  J.  M.  Bellew,  Samuel 
Longfellow,  Charles  and  Henry  Webb  (the 
Dromios),  Edna  Dean  Troctor,  Gerald 
Massey,  Clarence  A.  Seward,  Frederick 
Maccabe,  M.  D.  Conway,  the  Prince  of 
Conde,  and  John  L.  Toole.  That  this  re- 
pository of  autographs  is  appreciated  may 
be  inferred  from  the  fact  that  special  vigi- 
lance has  to  be  exercised  to  prevent  the 
hotel  registers  from  being  carried  off  or 
mutilated.  The  volume  containing  the  sig- 
nature of  Washington  Irving  was  stolen 
years  ago  and  it  has  been  vaguely  heard  of 
as  being  in  America, 

There  is  a  collection  of  autographs  of 
visitors  to  the  Shakespeare  Birthplace  that 
was  gathered  many  years  since  by  Mary 
Hornby,  custodian  of  that  cottage  (it  was 
she  who  whitewashed  the  walls  in  order  to 
obliterate  the  writings  upon  them,  when  she 
was  removed  from  her  office  in  1820),  and 
this  is  now  in  the  possession  of  her  grand- 
daughter, Mrs.  Smith,  a  resident  in  Strat- 
ford ;  but  many  valuable  names  have  been 
taken  from  it  —  among  others  that  of  Lord 
Byron.  The  mania  for  obtaining  relics 
of  Stratford  antiquity  is  remarkable.     Men- 


1 66  Shakespeare's  town. 

tion  is  made  of  an  unknown  lady  who 
came  to  the  birth-room  of  Shakespeare, 
and,  after  begging  in  vain  for  a  piece  of 
the  woodwork  or  of  the  stone,  presently 
knelt  and  wiped  the  floor  with  her  glove, 
which  then  she  carefully  rolled  up  and  se- 
creted, declaring  that  she  would,  at  least, 
possess  some  of  the  dust  of  that  sacred 
chamber.  It  is  a  creditable  sentiment, 
though  not  altogether  a  rational  one,  that 
impels  devotional  persons  to  such  conduct 
as  that ;  but  the  entire  Shakespeare  cottage 
would  soon  disappear  if  such  a  passion  for 
relics  were  practically  gratified.  The  ele- 
mental feeling  is  one  of  reverence,  and  this 
is  perhaps  indicated  in  the  following  lines 
with  which  the  present  writer  began  a  new 
volume  of  the  Red  Horse  register,  on  July 
21,  1889 :  — 

Shakespeare. 

While  evening  waits  and  hearkens, 

While  yet  the  song-bird  calls, — 
Before  the  last  light  darkens, 

Before  the  last  leaf  falls,  — 
Once  more  with  reverent  feeling 

This  sacred  shrine  I  seek ; 
By  silent  awe  revealing 

The  love  I  cannot  speak. 


UP   AND   DOWN    THE   AVON.  1 67 


XI. 

UP   AND    DOWN    THE    AVON. 

STRATFORD-UPON-AVON,  August  22, 
1889.  — The  river  life  of  Stratford  is 
one  of  the  chief  delights  of  this  delightful 
town.  The  Avon,  according  to  law,  is 
navigable  from  its  mouth,  at  Tewkesbury, 
where  it  empties  into  the  Severn,  as  far 
upward  as  Warwick  ;  but  according  to  fact 
it  is  passable  only  to  the  resolute  navigator 
who  can  surmount  obstacles.  From  Tewkes- 
bury up  to  Evesham  there  is  plain  sailing. 
Above  Evesham  there  are  occasional  bar- 
riers. At  Stratford  there  is  an  abrupt  pause 
at  the  Lucy  mill,  and  your  boat  must  be 
taken  ashore,  dragged  a  little  way  over  the 
meadow,  and  launched  again.  The  Lucy 
mill  is  just  below  the  Shakespeare  church, 
and  from  this  point  up  to  Clopton's  bridge 
the  river  is  broad.  Here  the  boat-races  are 
rowed  almost  every  year.  Here  the  stream 
ripples  against  the  pleasure-ground  called 
the  Bancroft,    skirts   the  gardens   of    the 


1 68  UP   AND    DOWN    THE    AVON. 

Shakespeare  Memorial,  glides  past  the  lovely 
lawns  of  Avonbank — the  home  of  that 
noble  public  benefactor  and  fine  Shake- 
spearean scholar,  Charles  Edward  Flower 
—  and  breaks  upon  the  sustaining  wall  of 
the  churchyard,  crowned  with  the  high  and 
thick-leaved  elms  that  nod  and  whisper  over 
Shakespeare's  dust.  The  town  lies  on  the 
left  or  west  bank  of  the  Avon,  as  you 
ascend  the  river,  looking  northward.  On 
the  right  or  east  bank  there  is  a  wide  stretch 
of  meadow.  To  float  along  here  in  the 
gloaming,  when  the  bats  are  winging  their 
"  cloistered  Alight,"  when  great  flocks  of 
starlings  are  flying  rapidly  over,  when  ' '  the 
crow  makes  wing  to  the  rooky  wood," 
when  the  water  is  as  smooth  as  a  mirror 
of  burnished  steel,  and  equally  the  grasses 
and  flowers  upon  the  banks  and  the  stately 
trees  and  the  gray  and  solemn  and  beauti- 
ful church  are  reflected  deep  in  the  lucid 
stream,  is  an  experience  of  thoughtful 
pleasure  that  sinks  deep  into  the  heart 
and  will  never  be  forgotten.  You  do  not 
know  Stratford  till  you  know  the  Avon. 

From  Clopton's  bridge  upward  the  river 
winds  capriciously  between  banks  that  are 
sometimes  fringed  with  willows  and  some- 
times  bordered  with  grassy  meadows   or 


UP   AND    DOWN    THE   AVON.  1 69 

patches  of  woodland  or  cultivated  lawns, 
enclosing  villas  that  seem  the  chosen  homes 
of  all  this  world  can  give  of  loveliness  and 
peace.  The  course  is  now  entirely  clear  for 
several  miles.  Not  till  you  pass  the  foot  of 
Alveston  village  does  any  obstacle  present 
itself ;  but  there,  as  well  as  a  little  further 
on,  by  Hatton  Rock,  the  stream  runs  shal- 
low and  the  current  becomes  very  swift, 
dashing  over  sandy  banks  and  great  masses 
of  tangled  grass  and  weeds.  These  are  ' '  the 
rapids,"  and  through  these  the  mariner  must 
make  his  way  by  adroit  steering  and  a  vigor- 
ous and  expert  use  of  oars  and  boat-hooks. 
The  Avon  now  is  bowered  by  tall  trees,  and 
upon  the  height  that  it  skirts  you  see  the 
house  of  Eyon  Hill  —  celebrated  in  the  novel 
of  Asphodel,  by  Miss  Braddon.  This  part  of 
the  river,  closed  in  from  the  world  and  pre- 
senting in  each  direction  twinkling  vistas  of 
sun  and  shadow,  is  especially  lovely.  Here, 
in  a  quiet  hour,  the  creatures  that  live  along 
these  shores  will  freely  show  themselves 
and  their  busy  ways.  The  water-rat  comes 
out  of  his  hole  and  nibbles  at  the  reeds 
or  swims  sturdily  across  the  stream.  The 
moor-hen  flutters  out  of  her  nest  among  the 
long,  green  rushes  and  skims  from  bank  to 
bank.      The  nimble   little   wagtail  flashes 


170  UP   AND    DOWN    THE    AVON. 

through  the  foliage.  The  squirrel  leaps 
among  the  boughs,  and  the  rabbit  scampers 
into  the  thicket.  Sometimes  a  kingfisher, 
with  his  shining  azure  shield,  pauses  for  a 
moment  among  the  gnarled  roots  upon  the 
brink.  Sometimes  a  heron,  disturbed  in 
her  nest,  rises  suddenly  upon  her  great 
wings  and  soars  grandly  away.  Once,  row- 
ing down  this  river  at  nearly  midnight,  I 
surprised  an  otter  and  heard  the  splash  of 
his  precipitate  retreat.  The  ghost  of  an 
old  gypsy,  who  died  by  suicide  upon  this 
wooded  shore,  is  said  to  haunt  the  neigh- 
bouring crag  ;  but  this,  like  all  other  ghosts 
that  ever  I  came  near,  eluded  equally  my 
vision  and  my  desire.  But  it  is  a  weird  spot 
at  night. 

Near  Alveston  mill  you  must  drag  your 
boat  over  a  narrow  strip  of  land  and  launch 
her  again  for  Charlecote.  Now  once  more 
this  delicious  water-way  is  broad  and  fine 
as  it  sweeps  past  the  stately,  secluded  homes 
upon  the  Warwick  road.  A  great  bed  of 
cultivated  white  water-lilies  (hitherto  they 
have  all  been  yellow)  presently  adorns  it, 
and  soon  there  are  glimpses  of  the  deer  that 
browse  or  prance  or  slumber  beneath  the 
magnificent  oaks  and  elms  and  limes  and 
chestnuts  of  Charlecote  Park.    No  view  of 


UP   AND   DOWN   THE   AVON.  I7I 

Charlecote  can  compare  with  the  view  of  it 
that  is  obtained  from  tlie  river ;  and  if  its 
proprietor  values  its  reputation  for  beauty- 
he  ought  to  be  glad  that  lovers  of  the  beau- 
tiful sometimes  have  an  opportunity  to  see 
it  from  this  point.  The  older  wing,  with 
its  oriel  window  and  quaint  belfry,  is  of 
a  peculiar,  mellow  red,  relieved  against 
bright  green  ivy,  to  which  only  the  brush 
of  an  artist  could  do  justice.  Nothing  more 
delicious,  in  its  way,  is  to  be  found ;  at 
least,  the  only  piece  of  architecture  in  this 
region  that  excels  it  in  beauty  of  colour  is 
the  ancient  house  of  Compton-Winyate ; 
but  that  is  a  marvel  of  loveliness,  the  gem 
of  Warwickshire,  and  surpasses  all  its  fel- 
lows. The  towers  of  the  main  building  of 
Charlecote  are  octagon,  and  a  happy  alter- 
nation of  thin  and  slender  with  stout  and 
stunted  turrets  much  enhances  the  effect  of 
quaintness  in  this  grave  and  opulent  edifice. 
A  walled  terrace,  margined  with  urns  and 
blazing  with  flowers  of  gold  and  crimson, 
extends  from  the  river  front  to  the  water 
side,  and  terminates  in  a  broad  flight  of 
stone  steps,  at  the  foot  of  which  are  moored 
the  barges  of  the  house  of  Lucy.  No  spec- 
tacle could  suggest  more  of  aristocratic 
state  and  austere  magnificence  than  this 


172    UP  AND  DOWN  THE  AVON. 

sequestered  edifice  does,  standing  there, 
silent,  antique,  venerable,  gorgeous,  sur- 
rounded by  its  vast,  thick-wooded  park, 
and  musing,  as  it  has  done  for  hundreds 
of  years,  on  the  silver  Avon  that  murmurs 
at  its  base.  Close  by  there  is  a  lovely 
waterfall,  over  which  some  little  tributary 
of  the  river  descends  in  a  fivefold  wave  of 
shimmering  crystal,  wafting  a  music  that  is 
heard  in  every  chamber  of  the  house  and  in 
all  the  fields  and  woodlands  round  about. 
It  needs  the  sun  to  bring  out  the  rich  colours 
of  Charlecote,  but  once  when  I  saw  it  from 
the  river  a  storm  was  coming  on,  and  vast 
masses  of  black  and  smoke-coloured  cloud 
were  driving  over  it  in  shapeless  blocks  and 
jagged  streamers,  while  countless  frightened 
birds  were  whirling  above  it ;  and  presently, 
when  the  fierce  lightning  flashed  across  the 
heavens  and  the  deluge  of  rain  descended 
and  beat  upon  it,  a  more  romantic  sight 
was  never  seen. 

Above  Charlecote  the  Avon  grows  nar- 
row for  a  space,  and  after  you  pass  under 
Hampton  Lucy  bridge  your  boat  is  much 
entangled  in  river  grass  and  much  impeded 
by  whirls  and  eddies  of  the  shallowing 
stream.  There  is  another  mill  at  Hampton 
Lucy,  and  a  little  way  beyond  the  village 


UP    AND    DOWN    THE    AVON.  1/3 

your  further  progress  upward  is  stopped  by 
a  waterfall  —  beyond  which,  however,  and 
accessible  by  the  usual  expedient  of  drag- 
ging the  boat  over  the  land,  a  noble  reach 
of  the  river  is  disclosed,  stretching  away 
toward  Warwick,  where  the  wonderful  Cas- 
tle, and  sweet  St.  Mary's  tower,  and  Leices- 
ter's hospital,  and  the  cosy  Warwick  Arms 
await  your  coming  —  with  mouldering  Ken- 
ilworth  and  majestic  Stoneleigh  Abbey  re- 
served to  lure  you  still  further  afield.  But 
the  scene  around  Hampton  Lucy  is  not  one 
to  be  quickly  left.  There  the  meadows  are 
rich  and  green  and  fragrant.  There  the 
large  trees  give  grateful  shade  and  make 
sweet  music  in  the  summer  wind.  There, 
from  the  ruddy  village,  thin  spires  of  blue 
smoke  curl  upward  through  the  leaves  and 
seem  to  tell  of  comfort  and  content  beneath. 
At  a  little  distance  the  gray  tower  of  the 
noble  church  —  an  edifice  of  peculiar  and 
distinctive  majesty,  and  one  well  worthy  of 
the  exceptional  beauty  enshrined  within  it 
—  rears  itself  among  the  elms.  Close  by 
the  sleek  and  indolent  cattle  are  crouched 
upon  the  cool  sod,  looking  at  you  with 
large,  soft,  lustrous,  indifferent  eyes.  The 
waterfall  sings  on,  with  its  low  and  melan- 
choly plaint,   while  sometimes   the  silver 


174    UP  AND  DOWN  THE  AVON. 

foam  of  it  is  caught  up  and  whirled  away 
by  the  breeze.  The  waves  sparkle  on  the 
running  stream,  and  the  wild-flowers,  in 
gay  myriads,  glance  and  glimmer  on  the 
velvet  shore.  And  so,  as  the  sun  is  setting 
and  the  rooks  begin  to  fly  homeward,  you 
breathe  the  fragrant  air  from  Scarbank  and 
look  upon  a  veritable  place  that  Shake- 
speare may  have  had  in  mmd  when  he 
wrote  his  line  of  endless  melody  — 

"  I  know  a  bank  where  the  wild    thyme 
blows." 


in 


RAMBLES   IN   ARDEN.  1/5 


XII. 

RAMBLES    IN    ARDEN. 

STRATFOKD- UPON -AVON,  August 
27,  1889.  —  Among  the  many  charming 
rambles  that  may  be  enjoyed  in  the  vicinity 
of  Stratford,  the  ramble  to  Wootton-Wawen 
and  Henley-in-Arden  is  not  the  least  de- 
lightful. Both  those  places  are  on  the  Bir- 
mingham road ;  the  former  six  miles,  the 
latter  eight  miles  from  Stratford.  When 
you  stand  upon  the  bridge  at  Wootton  you 
are  only  one  hundred  miles  from  London, 
but  you  might  be  in  a  wilderness  a  thousand 
miles  from  any  city,  for  in  all  the  slumber- 
ous scene  around  you  there  is  no  hint  of 
anything  but  solitude  and  peace.  Close  by 
a  cataract  tumbles  over  the  rocks  and  fills 
the  air  with  music.  Not  far  distant  rises 
the  stately  front  of  Wootton  Hall,  an  old 
manor-house,  surrounded  with  green  lawns 
and  bowered  by  majestic  elms,  which  has 
always  been  a  Catholic  abode,  and  which  is 
never  leased  to  any  but  Catholic  tenants. 


176  RAMBLES    IN    ARDEN. 

A  cosy,  gabled  house,  standing  among  trees 
and  shrubs  a  little  way  from  the  roadside, 
is  the  residence  of  the  priest  of  this  hamlet 
—  an  antiquarian  and  a  scholar,  of  ample 
acquirements  and  fine  talent.  Across  the 
meadows,  in  one  direction,  peers  forth  a 
fine  specimen  of  the  timbered  cottage  of 
ancient  times  —  the  black  beams  conspicu- 
ous upon  the  white  surface  of  plaster. 
Among  the  trees,  in  another  direction,  ap- 
pears the  great  gray  tower  of  Wootton- 
Wawen  church,  a  venerable  relic  and  one 
in  which,  by  means  of  the  varying  orders 
of  its  architecture,  you  may  trace  the  whole 
ecclesiastical  history  of  England.  The  ap- 
proach to  that  church  is  through  a  green 
lane  and  a  wicket-gate,  and  when  you  come 
near  to  it  you  find  that  it  is  surrounded 
with  many  graves,  some  marked  and  some 
unmarked,  on  all  of  which  the  long  grass 
waves  in  rank  luxuriance  and  whispers 
softly  in  the  summer  breeze.  The  place 
seems  deserted.  Not  a  human  creature  is 
anywhere  visible,  and  the  only  sound  that 
breaks  the  stillness  of  this  August  afternoon 
is  the  cawing  of  a  few  rooks  in  the  lofty 
tops  of  the  neighbouring  elms.  The  actual 
life  of  all  places,  when  you  come  to  know  it 
well,  proves  to  be,  for  the  most  part,  con- 


'       RAMBLES   IN    ARDEX.  1 77 

ventional,  commonplace,  and  petty.  Hu. 
man  beings,  with  here  and  there  an  excep 
tion,  are  dull  and  tedious,  each  resembling 
the  other,  and  each  needlessly  laborious  to 
increase  that  resemblance.  In  this  respect 
all  parts  of  the  world  are  alike  —  and  there- 
fore the  happiest  traveller  is  he  who  keeps 
mostly  alone,  and  uses  his  eyes,  and  com- 
munes with  his  own  thoughts.  The  actual 
life  of  Wootton  is,  doubtless,  much  like  that 
of  other  hamlets  —  a  "noiseless  tenor"  of 
church  squabbles,  village  gossip,  and  dis- 
contented grumbling,  diversified  with  feed- 
ing and  drinking,  lawn  tennis,  matrimony, 
birth,  and  death.  But  as  I  looked  around 
upon  this  group  of  nestling  cottages,  these 
broad  meadows,  green  and  cool  in  the 
shadow  of  the  densely  mantled  trees,  and 
this  ancient  church,  gray  and  faded  with 
antiquity,  slowly  crumbling  to  pieces  amid 
the  fresh  and  everlasting  vitality  of  nature, 
I  felt  that  surely  here  might  at  last  be  dis- 
covered a  permanent  haven  of  refuge  from 
the  incessant  platitude  and  triviality  of 
ordinary  experience  and  the  strife  and  din 
of  the  world. 

Wootton-Wawen  church  is  one  of  the 
numerous  Catholic  buildings  of  about  the 
eleventh  century  that  still  survive  in  this 

M 


178  RAMBLES   IN   ARDEN. 

realm,  devoted  now  to  Protestant  worship. 
It  has  been  partly  restored,  but  most  of  it  is 
in  a  state  of  decay,  and  if  this  be  not  soon 
arrested  the  building  will  become  a  ruin. 
Its  present  vicar,  the  Rev.  Francis  T. 
Bramston,  is  making  vigorous  efforts  to  in- 
terest the  public  in  the  preservation  of  this 
ancient  monument,  and  those  efforts  ought 
to  succeed.  A  more  valuable  ecclesiastical 
relic  it  would  be  difficult  to  find,  even  in 
this  rich  region  of  antique  treasures,  the 
heart  of  England.  Its  sequestered  situation 
and  its  sweetly  rural  surroundings  invest  it 
with  peculiar  beauty.  It  is  associated, 
furthermore,  with  names  that  are  stately  in 
English  history  and  eminent  and  honoured 
in  English  literature  —  with  Henry  St.  John, 
Viscount  Bolingbroke,  whose  sister  reposes 
in  its  ancient  vaults,  and  with  William 
Somerville,  the  poet  who  wrote  The  Chase. 
It  was  not  until  I  actually  stood  upon  his 
tombstone  that  my  attention  was  directed 
to  the  name  of  that  old  author,  and  to  the 
presence  of  his  relics  in  this  remote  and 
lonely  place.  Somerville  lived  and  died  at 
Edston  Hall,  near  Wootton-Wawen,  and 
was  famous  in  his  day  as  a  Warwickshire 
squire  and  huntsman.  His  grave  is  in  the 
chancel  of  the  church,  and  the  following 


RAMBLES   IN   ARDEN  1 79 

excellent  epitaph,  written  by  himself,  is 
inscribed  upon  the  plain  blue  stone  that 
covers  it :  — 

H.  s.   E. 
OBiiT  17.  JULY.  1742. 

GULIELMDS    SOMERVltE.    ARM. 
SI   QUID    IN   ME    BONI    COMPERTUM 
HABEAS, 

IMITATE. 
SI   QUID    MALI,    TOTIS   VIRIBUS 
EVITA. 

CHRISTO    CONFIDE, 
ET   8CIAS    TE    QUOQUE    FRAGILEM 


ET    MORTALEM. 

Such  words  have  a  meaning  that  sinks 
deep  into  the  heart  when  they  are  read 
upon  the  gravestone  that  covers  the  poet's 
dust.  They  came  to  me  like  a  message 
from  an  old  friend  who  had  long  been  wait- 
ing for  the  opportunity  of  this  solemn 
greeting  and  wise  counsel.  Another  epi- 
taph written  by  Somerville  —  and  one  that 
shows  equally  the  kindness  of  his  heart  and 
the  quaintness  of  his  character  —  appears 
upon  a  little,  low,  lichen-covered  stone  in 
Wootton-AVawen  churchyard,  where  it  com- 
memorates his  huntsman  and  butler,  Jacob 


l8o  RAMBLES    IN   ARDEN. 

Bocter,  who  was  hurt  in  the  hunting-field, 
and  died  of  this  accident :  — 

H.   s.    E. 

JACOBUS    BOCTEK. 

GULIELMO    SOMERVILE    ARMIGRO 

PROMUS   ET   CANIBUS   VENATICIS 

PRAEP08IT0R 

DOMI.    rORISQUE    FIDELI8 

EQUO    INTER    VENANDUM    CORUENTE 

ET    INTESTINIS   GRAVITER    COLLISIS 

POST   TRIDUUM    DEPLORANDUS. 

OBIIT 

28    DIE    JAN., 

ANNO   DNI    1719. 

AETAT    38. 

The  pilgrim  who  rambles  as  far  as  Woot- 
ton-Wawen  will  surely  stroll  onward  to 
Henley-in-Arden.  The  whole  of  that  region 
was  originally  covered  by  the  Forest  of 
Arden  i  —  the  woods  that  Shakespeare  had 
in  mind  when  he  was  writing  As  You  Like 
It,  a  comedy  whereof  the  atmosphere,  foli- 
age, flowers,  scenery,  and  spirit  are  purely 
those  of  his  native  Warwickshire.     Henley, 

1  That  learned  antiquarian  "W.  G.  Fretton,  Esq., 
of  Coventry,  has  shown  that  the  Forest  of  Arden  cov- 
ered a  large  tract  of  laud  extending  many  miles  west 
and  north  of  the  bank  of  the  Avon,  around  Stratford. 


RAMBLES    IN   ARDEN.  161 

if  the  observer  may  judge  by  the  numerous 
inns  that  fringe  its  long,  straggling,  pictu- 
resque street,  must  once  have  been  a  fa- 
vourite halting-place  for  the  coaches  that 
plied  between  London  and  Birmingham. 
They  are  mostly  disused  now,  and  the  little 
town  sleeps  in  the  sun  and  seems  forgotten. 
There  is  a  beautiful  specimen  of  the  ancient 
market-cross  in  its  centre  —  gray  and  som- 
bre and  much  frayed  by  the  tooth  of  time. 
Close  beside  Henley,  and  accessible  in  a 
walk  of  a  few  minutes,  is  the  church  of  Beau- 
desert,  which  is  one  of  the  most  precious 
of  the  ecclesiastic  gems  of  England.  Here 
you  will  see  architecture  of  mingled  Saxon 
and  Norman  —  the  solid  Norman  buttress, 
the  castellated  tower,  the  Saxon  arch 
moulded  in  zig-zag,  which  is  more  ancient 
than  the  dog-tooth,  and  the  round,  compact 
columns  of  the  early  English  order.  Above 
the  church  rises  a  noble  hill,  upon  which, 
in  the  middle  ages,  stood  a  castle  —  proba- 
bly that  of  Peter  de  Montfort  —  and  from 
which  a  comprehensive  and  superb  view 
may  be  obtained,  over  many  miles  of  ver- 
dant meadow  and  bosky  dell,  interspersed 
with  red-roofed  villages  from  which  the 
smoke  of  the  cottage-chimneys  curls  up  in 
thin  blue  spirals  under  the  gray  and  golden 


l82  RAMBLES    IN   ARDEN. 

sunset  sky.  An  old  graveyard  encircles  the 
church,  and  by  its  orderly  disorder  —  the 
quaint,  graceful  work  of  capricious  time  — 
enhances  the  charm  of  its  venerable  and 
storied  age.  There  are  only  one  hundred 
and  forty-six  members  of  the  parish  of 
Beaudesert.  I  v^^as  privileged  to  speak  with 
the  aged  rector,  the  Rev.  John  Anthony 
Pearson  Linskill,  and  to  view  the  church 
under  his  kindly  guidance.  In  the  ordinary 
course  of  nature  it  is  unlikely  that  we  shall 
ever  meet  again,  but  his  goodness,  his  benev- 
olent mind,  and  the  charm  of  his  artless 
talk  will  not  be  forgotten. i  My  walk  that 
night  took  me  miles  away  —  to  Claverdon 
and  home  by  Bearley;  and  all  the  time  it 
•was  my  thought  that  the  best  moments  of 
our  lives  are  those  in  which  we  are  touched, 
chastened,  and  ennobled  by  parting  and  by 
regret.  Nothing  is  said  so  often  as  good- 
bye.    But  in  the  lovely  words  of  Cowper — 

**  The  path  of  sorrow,  and  that  path  alone, 
Leads  to  the  land  where  sorrow  is  unknown." 

1  This  venerable  clergyman  died  in  the  rectory  of 
Beaudesert  in  February  1890  and  was  buried  withiu 
the  shadow  of  the  church  that  he  loved.  The  pictu- 
resque rectory  of  Beaudesert  is  the  birthplace  of 
Richard  Jago  [1715-1781],  the  poet  who  wrote  Edge- 
hill. 


THE  STRATFORD  FOUNTAIN.    1 83 


XIIL 

THE    STRATFORD    FOUNTAIN. 

AMERICAN  interest  in  Stratford-upon- 
Avon  springs  out  of  a  love  for  the 
v7orks  of  Shakespeare  as  profound  and  pas- 
sionate as  that  of  the  most  sensitive  and 
reverent  of  the  poet's  countrymen.  It  was 
the  father  of  American  literature  —  Wash- 
ington Irving  —  who  in  modern  times  made 
the  first  pilgrimage  to  that  holy  land,  and 
set  the  good  example,  which  since  has  been 
followed  by  thousands,  of  worship  at  the 
shrine  of  Shakespeare.  It  was  an  Ameri- 
can—  the  alert  and  expeditious  P.  T.  Bar- 
num  —  who  by  suddenly  proposing  to  buy 
the  Shakespeare  cottage  and  transfer  it  to 
America  startled  the  English  into  buying  it 
for  the  nation.  It  is,  in  part,  to  Americai 
that  Stratford  owes  the  Shakespeare  Memo 
rial ;  for  while  the  land  on  which  it  stands 
was  given  by  that  public- spirited  citizen  of 
Stratford,  Charles  Edward  Flower — a  sound 
and  fine  Shakespeare  scholar,  as  his  acting 


l84        THE    STRATFORD    FOUNTAIN. 

edition  of  the  plays  may  testify  —  and  while 
money  to  pay  for  the  building  of  it  was 
freely  contributed  by  wealthy  residents  of 
Warwickshire,  and  by  men  of  all  ranks 
throughout  the  kingdom,  the  gifts  and 
labours  of  Americans  were  not  lacking  to 
that  good  cause.  Edwin  Booth  was  one  of 
the  earliest  contributors  to  the  Memorial 
fund,  and  the  names  of  Mr.  Herman  Vezin, 
Mr.  M.  D.  Conway,  Mr.  W.  H.  Reynolds, 
Mrs.  Bateman,  and  Mrs.  Louise  Chandler 
Moulton  appear  in  the  first  list  of  its  sub- 
scribers. Miss  Kate  Field  worked  for  its 
advancement  with  remarkable  energy  and 
practical  success.  Mary  Anderson  acted 
for  its  benefit  on  August  29,  1885.  In  the 
church  of  the  Holy  Trinity,  where  Shake- 
speare's dust  is  buried,  a  beautiful  stained 
window,  illustrative,  scripturally,  of  that 
solemn  epitome  of  human  life  which  the 
poet  gives  in  the  speech  of  Jaques  on  the 
seven  ages  of  man,  evinces  the  practical 
devotion  of  the  American  pilgrim ;  and 
many  a  heart  has  been  thrilled  with  rev- 
erent joy  to  see  the  soft  light  that  streams 
through  its  pictured  panes  fall  gently  on 
the  poet's  grave. 

Wherever  in  Stratford  you  come  upon 
anything  that  was  ever  associated,  even  re- 


THE    STRATFORD    FOUNTAIN.         1 85 

motely,  with  the  name  and  fame  of  Shake- 
speare, there  you  will  find  the  gracious 
tokens  of  American  homage.  The  libraries 
of  the  Birthplace  and  of  the  Memorial  alike 
contain  gifts  of  American  books.  New  Place 
and  Anne  Hathaway 's  Cottage  are  never 
omitted  from  the  American  traveller's 
round  of  visitations  and  duty  of  practical 
tribute.  The  Falcon,  with  its  store  of 
relics ;  the  romantic  Shakespeare  Hotel, 
with  its  rambling  passages,  its  quaint 
rooms  named  after  Shakespeare's  charac- 
ters, its  antique  bar  parlour,  and  the  rich 
collection  of  autographs  and  pictures  that 
has  been  made  by  Mrs.  Justins  ;  the  Gram- 
mar School  in  which  no  doubt  the  poet, 
"with  shining  morning  face"  of  boyhood, 
was  once  a  pupil ;  John  Marshall's  anti- 
quarian workshop,  from  which  so  many  of 
the  best  souvenirs  of  Stratford  have  pro- 
ceeded —  a  warm  remembrance  of  his  own 
quaintness,  kindness,  and  originality  being 
perhaps  the  most  precious  of  them  ;  the 
Town- Hall,  adorned  with  Gainsborough's 
eloquent  portrait  of  Garrick,  to  which  no 
engraving  does  justice  ;  the  Guild  chapel ; 
the  Clopton  bridge  ;  the  old  Lucy  mill ;  the 
footpath  across  fields  and  roads  to  Shot- 
tery,  bosomed  in  great  elms ;  and  the  an- 


1 86         THE    STRATFORD   FOUNTAIN. 

cient  picturesque  building,  four  miles  away, 
at  Wilmcote,  which  was  the  home  of  Mary 
Arden,  Shakespeare's  mother, — each  and 
every  one  of  those  storied  places  receives 
in  turn  the  tribute  of  the  wandering  Amer- 
ican, and  each  repays  him  a  hundred-fold 
in  charming  suggestiveness  of  association, 
in  high  thought,  and  in  the  lasting  im- 
pulse of  sweet  and  soothing  poetic  reverie. 
At  the  Red  Horse,  where  Mr.  William 
Gardner  Colbourne  maintains  the  tradi- 
tions of  old-fashioned  English  hospitality, 
he  finds  his  home ;  well  pleased  to  muse 
and  dream  in  Washington  Irving' s  parlour, 
while  the  night  deepens  and  the  clock  in 
the  distant  tower  murmurs  drowsily  in  its 
sleep.  Those  who  will  may  mock  at  his 
enthusiasm.  He  would  not  feel  it  but  for 
the  spell  that  Shakespeare's  genius  has  cast 
upon  the  world.  He  ought  to  be  glad  and 
grateful  that  he  can  feel  that  spell ;  and, 
since  he  does  feel  it,  nothing  could  be  more 
natural  than  his  desire  to  signify  that  he 
too,  though  born  far  away  from  the  old 
home  of  his  race,  and  separated  from  it  by 
three  thousand  miles  of  stormy  ocean,  has 
still  his  part  in  the  divine  legacy  of  Shake- 
speare, the  treasure  and  the  glory  of  the 
English  tongue. 


THE    STRATFORD    FOUNTAIN.         187 

A  noble  token  of  this  American  senti- 
ment, and  a  permanent  object  of  interest 
to  the  pilgrim  in  Stratford,  is  supplied  by 
the  Jubilee  gift  of  a  drinking-f ountain  made 
to  that  city  by  George  W.  Childs  of  Phila- 
delphia. It  never  is  a  surprise  to  hear  of 
some  new  instance  of  that  good  man's  con- 
stant activity  and  splendid  generosity  in 
good  works  ;  it  is  only  an  accustomed  pleas- 
ure. With  fine-art  testimonials  in  the  old 
world  as  well  as  at  home  his  name  will 
always  be  honourably  associated.  A  few 
years  ago  he  presented  a  superb  window  of 
stained  glass  to  Westminster  Abbey,  to 
commemorate,  in  Poets'  Corner,  George 
Herbert  and  William  Cowper.  He  has 
since  given  to  St.  Margaret's  church, 
Westminster,  where  John  Skelton  and  Sir 
James  Harrington  (1611-1677)  were  en- 
tombed, and  where  was  buried  the  headless 
body  of  Sir  Walter  Raleigh,  a  pictorial 
window  commemorative  of  John  Milton. 
His  fountain  at  Stratford  was  dedicated  on 
October  17,  1887,  with  appropriate  cere- 
monies conducted  by  the  city's  Mayor,  Sir 
Arthur  Hodgson  of  Clopton,  and  amid  gen- 
eral rejoicing.  Henry  Irving,  the  leader  of 
the  English  stage  and  the  most  illustrious 
of  English  actors  since  the  age  of  Garrick, 


l88        THE    STRATFORD    FOUNTAIN. 

delivered  an  address,  of  singular  felicity 
and  eloquence,  and  also  read  a  poem  com- 
posed for  the  occasion  by  Oliver  Wendell 
Holmes.  The  countrymen  of  Mr.  Childs 
are  not  less  interested  in  this  structure  than 
the  community  that  it  was  intended  to  hon- 
our and  benefit.  They  observe  with  satis- 
faction and  pride  that  he  has  made  this 
beneficent,  beautiful,  and  opulent  offering 
to  a  town  which,  for  all  of  them,  is  hallowed 
by  exalted  associations,  and  for  many  of 
them  is  endeared  by  delightful  memories. 
They  sympathise  also  with  the  motive  and 
feeling  that  prompted  him  to  offer  his  gift 
as  one  among  many  memorials  of  the  fif- 
tieth year  of  the  reign  of  Queen  Victoria. 
It  is  not  every  man  who  knows  how  to  give 
with  grace,  and  the  good  deed  is  ' '  done 
double "  that  is  done  at  the  right  time. 
Stratford  had  long  been  in  need  of  such  a 
fountain  as  Mr.  Childs  has  given,  and  there- 
fore it  satisfies  a  public  want,  at  the  same 
time  that  it  serves  a  purpose  of  ornamenta- 
tion and  bespeaks  and  strengthens  a  bond 
of  international  sympathy.  Rother  Square, 
in  which  the  structure  stands,  is  the  most 
considerable  open  tract  in  Stratford,  and  is 
situated  near  the  centre  of  the  town,  on  the 
west  side.     There,  as  also  at  the  intersec- 


.   THE    STRATFORD    FOUNTAIN.         1 89 

tion  of  High  and  Bridge  streets,  which  are 
the  principal  thoroughfares  of  the  city,  the 
farmers,  at  stated  mtervals,  range  their 
beasts  and  wagons  and  hold  a  market.  It 
is  easy  to  foresee  that  R other,  embellished 
with  this  monument,  which  combines  a 
convenient  clock-tower,  a  place  of  rest  and 
refreshment  for  man,  and  commodious 
drinking-troughs  for  horses,  cattle,  dogs, 
and  sheep,  will  soon  become  the  agricul- 
tural centre  of  the  region. 

The  base  of  the  monument  is  made  of 
Peterhead  granite  ;  the  superstructure  is  of 
gray  stone  from  Bolton,  Yorkshire.  The 
height  of  the  tower  is  fifty  feet.  On  the 
north  side  a  stream  of  water  flowing  con- 
stantly from  a  bronze  spout  falls  into  a 
polished  granite  basin.  On  the  south  side 
a  door  opens  into  the  interior.  The  deco- 
rations include  sculpi;ures  of  the  arms  of 
Great  Britain  alternated  with  the  eagle  and 
stripes  of  the  American  republic.  In  the 
second  story  of  the  tower,  lighted  by  glazed 
arches,  is  placed  a  clock,  and  on  the  out- 
ward faces  of  the  third  story  appear  four 
dials.  There  are  four  turrets  surrounding 
a  central  spire,  each  surmounted  with  a 
gilded  vane.  The  inscriptions  on  the  base 
are  these :  — 


190   THE  STRATFORD  FOUNTAIN. 


The  gift  of  an  American  citizen,  George  "W. 

Childs,  of  Pliiladelpliia,  to  the  town  of 

Shakespeare,  in  the  Jubilee  year 

of  Queen  Victoria. 


In  her  days  every  man  sliall  eat,  in  safety 
Under  his  own  vine,  what  he  plants ;  and  sing 
The  merry  songs  of  peace  to  all  his  neighbours. 
God  shall  be  truly  known:   and  those  about 

her 
From    her    shall   read    the    perfect  ways  of 

honour. 
And  by  those  claim  their  greatness,  not  by 

blood. 

Henry  VIII.,  Act  v.  Scene  4. 


Honest  water,  which  ne'er  left  man  i'  the  mire. 
Timon  of  Athens,  Act  i.  Scene  2. 


Ten  thousand  honours  and  blessings  on  the 
bard  who  has  thus  gilded  the  dull  realities  of 
life  with  innocent  illusions.  —  Washington  Ir- 
ving^s  Stratford-on-Avon. 

Stratford-upon-Avon,  fortunate  in  many 
things,  is  especially  fortunate  in  being  situ- 
ated at  a  considerable  distance  from  the 


THE    STRATFORD    FOUNTAIN.         I9I 

main  line  of  any  railway.  Two  railroads 
indeed  skirt  the  town,  but  both  are 
branches,  and  travel  upon  them  has  not 
yet  become  too  frequent.  Stratford,  there- 
fore, still  retains  a  measure  of  its  ancient 
isolation,  and  consequently  a  flavour  ot 
quaintness.  Antique  customs  are  still  prev- 
alent there,  and  odd  characters  may  still  be 
encountered.  The  current  of  village  gossip 
flows  with  incessant  vigour,  and  nothing 
happens  in  the  place  that  is  not  thoroughly 
discussed  by  its  inhabitants.  An  event  so 
important  as  the  establishment  of  the 
American  Fountain  would  excite  great  in- 
terest throughout  Warwickshire.  It  would 
be  pleasant  to  hear  the  talk  of  those  old 
cronies  who  drift  into  the  bar-parlour  of  the 
Red  Horse  on  a  Saturday  evening,  as  they 
comment  on  the  liberal  American  who  has 
thus  enriched  and  beautified  their  town. 
The  Red  Horse  circle  is  but  one  of  many 
in  which  the  name  of  George  W.  Childs  is 
spoken  with  esteem  and  cherished  with  af- 
fection. The  present  writer  has  made 
many  visits  to  Stratford  and  has  passed 
much  time  there,  and  he  has  observed  on 
many  occasions  the  admiration  and  grati- 
tude of  the  Warwickshire  people  for  the 
American  philanthropist.     In  the  library  of 


192    THE  STRATFORD  FOUNTAIN. 

Charles  Edward  Flower,  at  Avonbank ;  in 
the  opulent  gardens  of  Edgar  Flower,  on 
the  Hill ;  in  the  lovely  home  ot  Alderman 
Bird  ;  at  the  hospitable  table  of  Sir  Arthur 
Hodgson,  in  Clopton  house  ;  and  in  many- 
other  representative  places  he  has  heard 
that  name  spoken,  and  always  with  delight 
and  honour.  Time  will  only  deepen  and 
widen  the  loving  respect  with  which  it  is 
hallowed.  In  England  more  than  any- 
where else  on  earth  the  record  of  good 
deeds  is  made  permanent,  not  alone  with 
imperishable  symbols,  but  in  the  hearts  of 
the  people.  The  inhabitants  of  Warwick- 
shire, guarding  and  maintaining  their  Strat- 
ford Fountain,  will  not  forget  by  whom  it 
was  given.  Wherever  you  go,  in  the  Brit- 
ish islands,  you  find  memorials  of  the 
past  and  of  individuals  who  have  done  good 
deeds  in  their  time,  and  you  also  find  that 
those  memorials  are  respected  and  pre- 
served. Warwickshire  abounds  with  them. 
Many  such  emblems  might  be  indicated. 
Each  one  of  them  takes  its  place  in  the 
regard  and  gradually  becomes  entwined 
with  the  experience  of  the  whole  commu- 
nity. So  it  will  be  with  the  Childs  Foun- 
tain at  Stratford.  The  children  trooping 
home  from  school  will  drink  of  it  and  sport 


THE    STRATFORD    FOUNTAIN.         I93 

in  its  shadow,  and,  reading  upon  its  base 
tlie  name  of  its  founder,  will  think  with 
pleasure  of  a  good  man's  gift.  It  stands  in 
the  track  of  travel  between  Banbury,  Ship- 
ston,  Stratford,  and  Birmingham,  and  many- 
weary  men  and  horses  will  pause  beside  it 
every  day,  for  a  moment  of  refreshment 
and  rest.  On  festival  days  it  will  be  hung 
Math  garlands,  while  all  around  it  the  air  is 
glad  with  music.  And  often  in  the  long, 
sweet  gloaming  of  the  summer  times  to 
come  the  rower  on  the  limpid  Avon,  that 
murmurs  by  the  ancient  town  of  Shake- 
speare, will  pause  with  suspended  oar  to 
hear  its  silver  chimes.  If  the  founder  of 
that  fountain  had  been  capable  of  a  selfish 
thought  he  could  have  taken  no  way  better 
or  more  certain  than  this  for  the  perpetua- 
tion of  his  name  in  the  affectionate  esteem  of 
one  of  the  loveliest  places  and  one  of  the 
most  sedate  communities  in  the  world. 

Autumn  in  England  —  and  all  the  country 
ways  of  lovely  Warwickshire  are  strewn 
with  fallen  leaves.  But  the  cool  winds  are 
sweet  and  bracing,  the  dark  waters  of  the 
Avon,  shimmering  in  mellow  sunlight  and 
frequent  shadow,  flow  softly  past  the  hal- 
lowed church,  and  the  reaped  and  gleaned 
and    empty   meadows  invite    to    many  a 

N 


194        THE    STRATFORD   FOUNTAIN. 

healthful  ramble  far  and  wide  over  the 
country  of  Shakespeare.  It  is  a  good  time 
to  be  there.  Now  will  the  robust  pedestrian 
make  his  jaunt  to  Charlecote  Park  and 
Hampton  Lucy,  to  Stoneleigh  Abbey,  to 
Warwick  and  Kenilworth,  to  Guy's  Cliff, 
with  its  weird  avenue  of  semi-blasted  trees, 
to  the  Blacklow  Hill  —  where  sometimes  at 
still  midnight  the  shuddering  peasant  hears 
the  ghostly  funeral  bell  of  Sir  Piers  Gave- 
ston  sounding  ruefully  from  out  the  bl^ck 
and  gloomy  woods  —  and  to  many  another 
historic  haunt  and  high  poetic  shrine.  All 
the  country-side  is  full  of  storiad  resorts 
and  cosy  nooks  and  comfortable  inns.  But 
neither  now  nor  hereafter  will  it  be  other- 
wise than  grateful  and  touching  to  such  an 
explorer  of  haunted  Warwickshire  to  see, 
among  the  emblems  of  poetry  and  romance 
which  are  its  chief  glory,  this  new  token 
of  American  sentiment  and  friendship,  the 
Fountain  of  Stratford. 


BOSWORTH   FIELD.  I95 


XIV. 

BOSWORTH    FIELD. 

WAEWICK,  August  29,  1889.— It  has 
* »  long  been  the  conviction  of  the  pres- 
ent writer  that  the  character  of  Richard 
III.  has  been  distorted  and  maligned  by 
the  old  historians  from  whose  authority 
the  accepted  view  of  it  is  derived.  He 
was,  it  is  certain,  a  superb  soldier,  a  wise 
statesman,  a  judicious  legislator,  a  natural 
ruler  of  men,  and  a  prince  most  accom- 
plished in  music  and  the  fine  arts  and  in 
the  graces  of  social  life.  Some  of  the  best 
laws  that  ever  were  enacted  in  England 
were  enacted  during  his  reign.  His  title  to 
the  throne  of  England  was  absolutely  clear, 
as  against  the  Earl  of  Richmond,  and  but 
for  the  treachery  of  some  among  his  fol- 
lowers he  would  have  prevailed  in  the  con- 
test upon  Bosworth  Field,  and  would  have 
vindicated  and  maintained  that  title  over 
all  opposition.  He  lost  the  battle,  and  he 
was  too  great  a  man  to  survive  the  ruin  of 


196  BOSWORTH    FIELD. 

his  fortunes.  He  threw  away  his  life  in 
the  last  mad  charge  upon  Richmond  that 
day,  and  when  once  the  grave  had  closed 
over  him,  and  his  usurping  cousin  had 
seized  the  English  crown,  it  naturally  must 
have  become  the  easy  as  well  as  the  politic 
business  of  history  to  blacken  his  char- 
acter. England  was  never  ruled  by  a  more 
severe  monarch  than  the  austere,  crafty, 
avaricious  Henry  VII.,  and  it  is  certain 
that  no  word  in  praise  of  his  predecessor 
could  have  been  publicly  said  in  England 
during  Henry's  reign :  neither  would  it 
have  been  safe  for  anybody  to  speak  for 
Richard  and  the  House  of  York  in  the  time 
of  Henry  VIII.,  the  cruel  Mary,  or  the  illus- 
trious Elizabeth.  The  drift,  in  fact,  was 
all  the  other  way.  The  Life  of  Richard 
III.  by  Sir  Thomas  More  is  the  fountain- 
head  of  the  other  narratives  of  his  career, 
and  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  More, 
who  as  a  youth  had  lived  at  Canterbury,  in 
the  palace  of  Archbishop  Morton,  derived 
his  views  of  Richard  from  that  prelate  — 
to  whose  hand  indeed,  the  essential  part 
of  the  Life  has  been  attributed.  "Morton 
is  fled  to  Richmond."  He  was  Bishop 
of  Ely  when  he  deserted  the  king,  and 
Henry  VII.  rewarded  him  by  making  him 


BOSWORTH    FIELD.  I97 

Archbishop  of  Canterbury.  No  ir^n  of 
tlie  time  was  so  Httle  likely  as  Morton  to 
take  an  unprejudiced  view  of  Kichard  III. 
It  is  the  Morton  view  that  has  become  his- 
tory. The  world  still  looks  at  Richard 
through  the  eyes  of  his  victorious  foe.  More- 
over, the  Morton  view  has  been  stamped 
indelibly  upon  the  imagination  and  the  cre- 
dulity of  mankind  by  the  overwhelming 
and  irresistible  genius  of  Shakespeare  — 
who  wrote  Bidiard  III.  in  the  reign  of  the 
granddaughter  of  Henry  VII.,  and  who, 
aside  from  the  safeguard  of  discretion,  saw 
dramatic  possibilities  in  the  man  of  dark 
passions  and  deeds  that  he  could  not  have 
seen  in  a  more  human  and  a  more  virtuous 
monarch.  Goodness  is  generally  monoto- 
nous. "  The  low  sun  makes  the  colour." 
It  is  not  to  be  supposed  that  Richard  was  a 
model  man  ;  but  there  are  good  reasons  for 
thinking  that  he  was  not  so  black  as  his  ene- 
mies painted  him ;  and,  good  or  bad,  he  is 
one  of  the  most  fascinating  personalities  that 
history  and  literature  have  made  immortal. 
It  was  with  no  common  emotion,  therefore, 
that  I  stood  upon  the  summit  of  Ambien 
Hill  and  looked  downward  over  the  plain 
where  Richard  fought  his  last  fight  and 
went  gloriously  to  his  death. 


igU  BOSWORTH    FIELD. 

Thg  battle  of  Bosworth  Field  was  fought 
on  August  22,  1485.  More  than  four  hun- 
dred years  have  passed  since  then :  yet 
except  for  the  incursions  of  a  canal  and  a 
railway  the  aspect  of  that  plain  is  but  little 
changed  from  what  it  was  when  Richard 
surveyed  it  on  that  gray  and  sombre  morn- 
ing when  he  beheld  the  forces  of  Richmond 
advancing  past  the  marsh  and  knew  that 
the  crisis  of  his  life  had  come.  The  earl 
was  pressing  forward  that  day  from  Tam- 
worth  and  Atherstone,  which  are  in  the 
northern  part  of  Warwickshire  —  the  latter 
being  close  upon  the  Leicestershire  border. 
His  course  was  a  little  to  the  southeast, 
and  Richard's  forces,  facing  northwesterly, 
confronted  their  enemies  from  the  summit 
of  a  long  and  gently  sloping  hill  that  ex- 
tends for  several  miles,  about  east  and 
west,  from  Market  Bosworth  on  the  right, 
to  the  vicinity  of  Dadlington  on  the  left. 
The  king's  position  had  been  chosen  with 
an  excellent  judgment  that  has  more  than 
once,  in  modern  times,  elicited  the  admira- 
tion of  accomplished  soldiers.  His  right 
wing,  commanded  by  Lord  Stanley,  rested 
on  Bosworth.  His  left  was  protected  by  a 
marsh,  impassable  to  the  foe.  Sir  William 
Stanley  commanded  the  left  and  had  his 


BOSWORTH   FIELD.  I99 

headquarters  in  Dadlingtou.  Richard  rode 
in  the  centre.  Far  to  the  right  he  saw  tlie 
clustered  houses  and  tlie  graceful  spire  of 
Bosworth,  and  far  to  the  left  his  glance 
rested  on  the  little  church  of  Dadlington. 
Below  and  in  front  of  him  all  was  open 
field,  and  all  across  that  field  waved  the 
banners  and  sounded  the  trumpets  of  rebel- 
lion and  defiance.  It  is  easy  to  imagine 
the  glowing  emotions — the  implacable  re- 
sentment, the  passionate  fury,  and  the 
deadly  purpose  of  slaughter  and  vengeance 
—  with  which  the  imperious  and  terrible 
monarch  gazed  on  his  approaching  foes. 
They  show,  in  a  meadow,  a  little  way  over 
the  crest  of  the  hill,  where  it  is  marked  and 
partly  covered  now  by  a  pyramidal  struc- 
ture of  gray  stones,  suitably  inscribed  with 
a  few  commemorative  lines  m  Latin,  a 
spring  of  water  at  which  Richard  paused 
to  quench  his  thirst  before  he  made  that 
last  desperate  charge  on  Radmore  heath, 
when  at  length  he  knew  himself  betrayed 
and  abandoned,  and  felt  that  his  only  hope 
lay  in  killing  the  Earl  of  Richmond  with 
his  own  hand.  The  fight  at  Bosworth  was 
not  a  long  one.  Both  the  Stanleys  deserted 
the  king\s  standard  early  in  the  day.  It 
was  easy  for  them,  posted  as  they  were,  to 


200  BOSWORTH    FIELD. 

wheel  their  forces  into  the  rear  of  the  rebel 
army  at  the  right  and  the  left.  Nothing 
then  remained  for  Richard  but  to  rush 
down  upon  the  centre,  where  he  saw  the 
bamier  of  Richmond  —  borne  at  that  mo- 
ment by  Sir  William  Brandon  —  and  to 
crush  the  treason  at  its  head.  It  must 
have  been  a  charge  of  tremendous  impetu- 
osity. It  bore  the  fiery  king  a  long  way 
forward  on  the  level  plain.  He  struck 
down  Brandon  with  his  own  hand.  He 
plainly  saw  the  Earl  of  Richmond,  and 
came  almost  near  enough  to  encounter 
him,  when  a  score  of  swords  were  buried 
in  his  body,  and,  hacked  almost  into  pieces, 
he  fell  beneath  heaps  of  the  slain.  The 
place  of  his  death  is  now  the  junction  of 
three  country  roads,  one  leading  northwest 
to  Shenton,  one  southwest  to  Dadlington, 
and  one  bearing  away  easterly  toward  Bos- 
worth.  A  little  brook,  called  Sandy  Ford, 
flows  underneath  the  road,  and  there  is  a 
considerable  coppice  in  the  field  at  the 
junction.  Upon  the  peaceful  sign-board 
appear  the  names  of  Dadlington  and  Hinck- 
ley. Not  more  than  five  hundred  feet  dis- 
tant to  the  eastward  rises  the  embankment 
of  a  branch  of  the  Midland  Railway,  from 
Nuneaton  to  Leicester ;  while  at  about  the 


BOSWORTH   FIELD.  201 

same  distance  to  the  westward  rises  the 
similar  embankment  of  a  canal.  No  mon- 
ument has  been  erected  to  mark  the  spot 
where  Richard  III.  was  slain.  They  took 
up  his  mangled  body,  threw  it  across  a 
horse,  and  carried  it  into  the  town  of 
Leicester,  and  there  it  was  buried,  in  the 
church  of  the  Gray  Friars  —  also  the  sepul- 
chre of  Cardinal  Wolsey  —  now  a  ruin. 
The  only  commemorative  mark  upon  the 
battlefield  is  the  pyramid  at  the  well,  and 
that  stands  at  a  long  distance  from  the 
place  of  the  king's  fall.  I  tried  to  picture 
the  scene  of  his  final  charge  and  his  fright- 
ful death  as  I  stood  there  upon  the  hillside. 
Many  little  slate-coloured  clouds  were  drift- 
ing across  a  pale  blue  sky.  A  cool  summer 
breeze  was  sighing  in  the  branches  of  the 
neighbouring  trees.  The  bright  green  sod 
was  all  alive  with  the  sparkling  yellow  of 
the  colt's- foot  and  the  soft  red  of  the  clover. 
Birds  were  whistling  from  the  coppice  near 
by,  and  overhead  the  air  was  flecked  with 
innumerable  black  pinions  of  fugitive  rooks 
and  starlings.  It  did  not  seem  possible 
that  a  sound  of  war  or  a  deed  of  violence 
could  ever  have  intruded  to  break  the  Sab- 
bath stillness  of  that  scene  of  peace. 
The  water  of  Kmg  Richard's  Well  is  a 


202  BOSWORTH    FIELD. 

shallow  pool,  choked  now  with  moss  and 
weeds.  The  inscription,  which  was  written 
by  Dr.  Samuel  Parr,  of  Hatton,  reads  as 
follows  :  — 

AQVA.    EX.    HOC.    PVTEO.    HAVSTA 

SITIM.    SEDAVIT 

RICHARDVS.    TERTIVS.    EEX.    ANGLIAE 

CVM    HENRICO.    COMITE    DE     RICHMONDIA 

ACERRIME.  ATQVE.  INGENTISSIME.  PRAELIANS 

ET.    VITA.    PARITER.    AC.    SCEPTRO 

ANTE    NOCTEM.    CARITVRUS 

II    KAL.    SEP.    A.    D.    M.C.C.C.C.LXXXV. 

There  are  five  churches  in  the  immediate 
neighbourhood  of  Bosworth  Field,  all  of 
which  were  in  one  way  or  another  associ- 
ated with  that  memorable  battle.  Ratcliffe 
Culey  church  has  a  low  square  tower  and  a 
short  stone  spire,  and  there  is  herbage 
growing  upon  its  tower  and  its  roof.  It 
is  a  building  of  the  fourteenth  century, 
one  mark  of  this  period  being  its  perpen- 
dicular stone  font,  an  octagon  in  shape,  and 
much  frayed  by  time.  In  three  arches  of 
its  chancel,  on  the  south  side,  the  sculp- 
ture shows  tri-foliated  forms  of  exceptional 
beauty.  In  the  east  window  there  are 
fragments  of  old  glass,  rich  in  colour  and 
quaint  and  singular.     The   churchyard   is 


BOSWORTH   FIELD.  203 

full  of  odd  gravestones,  various  in  shape 
and  irregular  in  position.  An  ugly  slate- 
stone  is  much  used  in  Leicestershire  for 
monuments  to  the  dead.  Most  of  those 
stones  record  modern  burials,  the  older 
graves  being  unmarked.  The  grass  grows 
thick  and  dense  all  over  the  churchyard. 
Upon  the  church  walls  are  several  fine 
specimens  of  those  mysterious  ray  and 
circle  marks  which  have  long  been  a  puzzle 
to  the  archaeological  explorer.  Such  marks 
are  usually  found  in  the  last  bay  but  one, 
on  the  south  side  of  the  nave,  toward  the 
west  end  of  the  church.  On  Ratcliffe  Culey 
church  they  consist  of  central  points  with 
radial  lines,  like  a  star,  but  these  are  not 
enclosed,  as  often  happens,  with  circle  lines. 
Various  theories  have  been  advanced  by 
antiquarians  to  account  for  these  designs. 
Probably  these  marks  were  cut  upon  the 
churches,  by  the  pious  monks  of  old,  as 
emblems  of  eternity  and  of  the  Sun  of 
Righteousness. 

Shenton  Hall  (1629),  long  and  still  the 
seat  of  the  Woollastons,  stood  directly  in 
the  path  of  the  combatants  at  Bosworth 
Field,  and  the  fury  of  the  battle  must  have 
raged  all  around  it.  The  Hall  has  been  re- 
cased,  and,  except  for  its  old  gatehouse  and 


204  BOSWORTH   FIELD. 

semi- octagon  bays,  which  are  of  the  Tudoi 
style,  it  presents  a  modern  aspect.  Its 
windows  open  toward  Kadmore  Plain  and 
Ambien  Hill,  the  scene  of  the  conflict 
between  the  Red  Rose  and  the  White.  The 
church  has  been  entirely  rebuilt  —  a  hand- 
some edifice  of  crucial  form,  containing 
costly  pews  of  old  oak,  together  with  in- 
teresting brasses  and  busts  taken  from  the 
old  church  which  it  has  replaced.  The 
brasses  commemorate  Richard  Coate  and 
Joyce  his  wife,  and  Richard  Everard  and 
his  wife,  and  are  dated  1556, 1597,  and  1616. 
The  busts  are  of  white  marble,  dated  1666, 
and  are  commemorative  of  William  Wool- 
laston  and  his  wife,  once  lord  and  lady  of 
the  manor  of  Shenton.  It  was  the  rule,  in 
building  churches,  that  one  end  should  face 
to  the  east  and  the  other  to  the  west,  but 
you  frequently  find  an  old  church  that  is 
set  at  a  slightly  different  angle  —  that, 
namely,  at  which  the  sun  arose  on  the 
birthday  of  the  saint  to  whom  the  church 
was  dedicated.  The  style  of  large  east  and 
west  windows,  with  trefoil  or  other  orna- 
mentation in  the  heads  of  the  arches,  came 
into  vogue  about  the  time  of  Edward  I. 

Dadlington  was  Richard's  extreme  left  on 
the  day  of  the  battle  and  Bosworth  was  his 


BOSWORTH    FIELD.  205 

extreme  right.  These  positions  were  in- 
trusted to  the  Stanleys,  both  of  whom  be- 
trayed their  king.  Sir  William  Stanley's 
headquarters  were  at  Dadlington,  and  traces 
of  the  earthworks  then  thrown  up  there, 
by  Richard's  command,  are  still  visible. 
Dadlington  church  has  almost  crumbled  to 
pieces,  and  is  to  be  restored.  It  is  a  little 
low  structure,  with  a  wooden  tower, 
stuccoed  walls  and  a  tiled  roof,  and  it 
stands  in  a  graveyard  full  of  scattered 
mounds  and  slate-stone  monuments.  It 
was  built  in  Xorman  times,  and,  although 
still  used  it  has  long  been  little  better  than 
a  ruin.  One  of  the  bells  in  its  tower  is 
marked  "Thomas  Arnold  fecit,  1763"  — 
but  this  is  comparatively  a  modern  touch. 
The  church  contains  two  pointed  arches, 
and  across  its  roof  are  five  massive  oak 
beams  almost  black  with  age.  The  plaster 
ceiling  has  fallen,  in  several  places,  so  that 
patches  of  laths  are  visible  in  the  roof. 
The  pews  are  square,  box-like  structures, 
made  of  oak  and  very  old.  The  altar  is 
a  plain  oak  table,  supported  on  carved  legs, 
covered  with  a  cloth.  On  the  west  wall 
appears  a  tablet  inscribed  "  Thomas  Eames, 
church- warden,  1773."  Many  human  skel- 
etons, arranged  in  regular  tiers,  were  found 


206  BOSWORTH   FIELD. 

in  Dadlington  churchyard,  when  a  much- 
beloved  clergyman,  the  Rev.  Mr.  Bourne, 
vras  buried,  in  1881 ;  and  it  is  believed  that 
those  are  remains  of  men  who  fell  at  Bos- 
worth  Field.  The  only  inn  at  this  lonely 
place  bears  the  quaint  name  of  "The  Dog 
and  Hedgehog." 

The  following  queer  epitaph  appears  upon 
a  gravestone  in  Dadlington  churchyard.  It 
is  Thomas  Bolland,  1765,  who  thus  ex- 
presses his  mind,  in  mortuary  reminis- 
cence :  — 

"  I  lov'd  itiy  Honour'd  Parents  dear, 
I  lov'd  my  Wife's  and  Children  dear, 
And  hope  in  Heaven  to  meet  them  there. 
I  lov'd  my  Brothers  &  Sisters  too, 
And  hope  I  shall  them  in  Heaven  view. 
I  lov'd  my  Vncle's,  Aunt's,  &  Cousin's  too 
And  I  pray  God  to  give  my  children  grace 
the  same  to  do." 

Stoke  Golding  church  was  built  in  the 
fourteenth  century.  It  stands  now,  a  gray 
and  melancholy  relic  of  other  days,  strange 
and  forlorn  yet  august  and  stately,  in  a 
little  brick  village,  the  streets  of  which 
are  paved,  like  those  of  a  city,  with  blocks 
of  stone.  It  is  regarded  as  one  of  the  best 
specimens  extant  of  the  decorated  style  of 
early  English  ecclesiastical  architecture.     It 


BOSWORTH    FIELD.  20/ 

has  a  fine  tower  and  spire,  and  it  consists 
of  nave,  chantry,  and  south  aisle.  There  is 
a  perforated  parapet  on  one  side,  but  not  on 
the  otlier.  The  walls  of  the  nave  and  the 
chancel  are  continuous.  The  pinnacles, 
though  decayed,  show  that  they  must  have 
been  beautifully  carved.  One  of  the  deco- 
rative pieces  upon  one  of  them  is  a  rabbit 
with  his  ears  laid  back.  Lichen  and  grass 
are  growing  on  the  tower  and  on  the  walls. 
The  roof  is  of  oak,  the  mouldings  of  the 
arches  are  exceptionally  graceful,  and  the 
capitals  of  the  five  main  columns  present,  in 
marked  diversity,  carvings  of  faces,  flowers, 
and  leaves.  The  tomb  of  the  founder  is  on 
the  north  side,  and  the  stone  pavement  is 
everywhere  lettered  with  inscriptions  of 
burial.  There  is  a  fine  mural  brass,  bear- 
ing the  name  of  Brokesley,  1633,  and  a  su- 
perb "stocke  chest,"  1636  ;  and  there  is  a 
sculptured  font,  of  exquisite  symmetry. 
Some  of  the  carving  upon  the  oak  roof  is 
more  grotesque  than  decorative — but  this 
is  true  of  most  other  carving  to  be  found  in 
ancient  churches  ;  such,  for  example,  as 
you  may  see  under  the  miserere  seats  in 
the  chancel  of  Trinity  at  Stratford-upon- 
Avon.  There  was  formerly  some  beauti- 
ful old  stained  glass  in  the  east  window 


2o8  BOSWORTH    FIELD. 

of  Stoke  Golding  church,  but  this  has  dis- 
appeared. A  picturesque  stone  slab,  set 
upon  the  church  wall  outside,  arrests  at- 
tention by  its  pleasing  shape,  its  venerable 
aspect,  and  its  decayed  lettering ;  the  date 
is  1684.  Many  persons  slain  at  Bosworth 
Field  were  buried  in  Stoke  Golding  church- 
yard, and  over  their  nameless  graves  the 
long  grass  is  waving  in  indolent  luxuriance 
and  golden  light.  So  Nature  hides  waste 
and  forgets  pain.  Near  to  this  village  is 
Crown  Hill,  where  the  crown  of  England 
was  taken  from  a  hawthorn  bush,  whereon 
it  had  been  cast  in  the  frenzied  confusion 
of  defeat,  after  the  battle  of  Bosworth  was 
over  and  the  star  of  King  Eicliard  had  been 
quenched  in  death.  Crown  Hill  is  a  green 
meadow  now,  without  distinguishing  feat- 
ure, except  that  two  large  trees,  each  having 
a  double  trunk,  are  growing  in  the  middle 
of  it.  Not  distant  from  this  historic  spot 
stands  Higham-on-the-Hill,  where  there  is 
a  fine  church,  remarkable  for  its  Norman 
tower.  From  this  village  the  view  is  mag- 
nificent—  embracing  all  that  section  of 
Leicestershire  which  is  thus  haunted  with 
memories  of  King  Richard  and  of  the  car- 
nage that  marked  the  final  conflict  of  the 
white  and  red  roses. 


LICh^riELD    [I/^Tr^EDRA^L. 


THE   HOME   OF   DR.  JOHNSON.        209 


XV. 

THE    HOME    OF   DR.    JOHNSON. 

LICHFIELD,  Staffordshire,  July  31, 
1890.  —  To  a  man  of  letters  there  is  no 
name  in  the  long  annals  of  English  litera- 
ture more  interesting  and  significant  than 
the  name  of  Samuel  Johnson.  It  has  been 
truly  said  that  no  other  man  was  ever  sub- 
jected to  such  a  light  as  Boswell  threw 
upon  Johnson,  and  that  few  other  men 
could  have  endured  it  so  well.  He  was 
many  things  that  are  noble,  but  for  all 
men  of  letters  he  is  especially  noble  as  the 
champion  of  literature.  He  vindicated  the 
profession  of  letters.  He  lived  by  his  pen, 
and  he  taught  the  great  world,  once  for 
all,  that  it  is  honourable  so  to  live.  That 
lesson  was  needed  in  the  England  of  his 
period ;  and  from  that  period  onward  the 
literary  vocation  has  steadily  been  held  in 
higher  esteem  than  it  enjoyed  up  to  that 
time.  You  will  not  be  surprised  that  one 
of  the  humblest  of  his   followers   should 


210        THE    HOME    OF    DR.   JOHNSON. 

linger  for  a  while  in  the  ancient  town  that 
is  glorified  by  association  with  his  illus- 
trious name,  or  should  wish  to  send  a  word 
of  fealty  and  homage  from  the  birthplace  of 
Dr.  Johnson. 

Lichfield  is  a  cluster  of  rather  dingy 
streets  and  of  red-brick  and  stucco  build- 
ings, lying  in  a  vale  a  little  northward 
from  Birmingham,  diversified  by  a  couple 
of  artificial  lakes  and  glorified  by  one. of 
the  loveliest  churches  in  Europe.  Without 
its  church  the  town  would  be  nothing  ;  with 
its  church  it  is  everything.  Lichfield  cathe- 
dral, although  an  ancient  structure  —  dat- 
ing back,  indeed,  to  the  early  part  of  the 
twelfth  century  —  has  been  so  sorely  bat- 
tered first  and  last,  and  so  considerably 
"restored,"  that  it  presents  the  aspect 
of  a  building  almost  modern.  The  denote- 
ments of  antiquity,  however,  are  not  en- 
tirely absent  from  it,  and  altogether  it  is 
not  less  venerable  than  majestic.  No  one 
of  the  cathedrals  of  England  presents  a 
more  beautiful  faQade.  The  multitudinous 
statues  of  saints  and  kings  that  are  upon  it 
create  an  impression  of  royal  opulence.  The 
carving  upon  the  recesses  of  the  great  door- 
ways on  the  north  and  west  is  of  astonish- 
ing variety  and  loveliness.     The  massive 


THE    HOME    OF    DR.  JOHNSON.        211 

doors  of  dark  oak,  fretted  with  ironwork  of 
rare  delicacy,  are  impressive  and  altogether 
are  suitable  for  such  an  edifice.  Seven  of 
the  large  gothic  windows  in  the  chancel  are 
filled  with  genume  old  glass  —  not,  indeed, 
the  glass  that  they  originally  contamed, 
for  that  was  smashed  by  the  Puritan  fa- 
natics, but  a  great  quantity  (no  less  than 
at  least  340  pieces,  each  about  twenty-two 
inches  square)  made  in  Germany  in  the 
early  part  of  the  sixteenth  century  when 
the  art  of  staining  glass  was  at  its  summit 
of  skill.  This  treasure  was  given  to  the 
cathedral  by  a  liberal  friend,  Sir  Brooke 
Boothby,  who  had  obtained  it  by  pur- 
chase, in  1802,  from  the  dissolved  Abbey 
of  Herckenrode.  No  such  colour  as  that 
old  glass  presents  can  be  seen  in  the  glass 
that  is  manufactured  now.  It  is  imitated 
indeed,  but  it  does  not  last.  The  subjects 
portrayed  in  those  sumptuous  windows  are 
mostly  scriptural,  but  the  centre  window 
on  the  north  side  of  the  chancel  is  devoted 
to  portraits  of  noblemen,  one  of  them  being 
Errard  de  la  Marck,  who  was  enthroned 
Bishop  of  Liege  in  1505,  and  who,  toward 
the  end  of  his  stormy  life,  adopted  the  old 
Roman  motto  —  comprehensive  and  final  — 
which,  a  little  garbled,  appears  in  the  glass 
beneath  his  heraldic  arms  :  — 


212        THE    HOME    OF    r>R.   JOHNSOT^. 

"  Decipimus  YOtis ;  et  tempore  f  allimur  ; 
Et  Mors  deridet  curas  ;  anxia  vita  nihil." 

The  father  of  the  illustrious  Joseph 
Addison  was  Dean  of  this  cathedral  from 
1688  to  1703,  and  his  remains  are  buried 
in  the  ground,  near  the  west  door.  The 
stately  Latin  epitaph  was  written  by  his 
son.  This  and  several  other  epitaphs  here 
attract  the  interested  attention  of  literary 
students.  A  tablet  on  the  north  wall,  in 
the  porch,  commemorates  the  courage  and 
sagacity  of  Lady  Mary  Wortley  Montagu, 
who  introduced  into  England  the  practice 
of  inoculation  for  the  small-pox.  Anna 
Seward,  the  poet,  who  died  in  1809,  aged 
sixty-six,  and  who  was  one  of  the  friends 
of  Dr.  Johnson,  was  buried  and  is  commem- 
orated here,  and  the  fact  that  she  placed 
a  tablet  here  in  memory  of  her  father  is 
celebrated  in  sixteen  eloquent  and  felicitous 
lines  by  Sir  Walter  Scott.  The  father  was 
a  canon  of  Lichfield,  and  died  in  1790.  The 
reader  of  Boswell  will  not  fail  to  remark 
the  epitaph  on  Gilbert  Walmesley,  once 
registrar  of  the  ecclesiastical  court  of  Lich- 
field, and  one  of  Dr.  Johnson's  especial 
friends.  Of  Chappel  Woodhouse  it  is  sig- 
nificantly said,  upon  his  memorial  stone, 
that  he  was  ' '  lamented  most  by  those  who 


THE    HOME    OF    DR.    JOHNSON.        21 3 

knew  him  best."  Here  one  sees  two  of  the 
best  works  of  Chantrey  —  one  called  "The 
Sleeping  Children,"  erected  in  1817,  in 
memory  of  the  two  young  daughters  of  the 
Rev.  William  Robinson  ;  the  other  a  kneel- 
ing figure  of  Bishop  Ryder,  who  died  in 
1836.  The  former  was  one  of  the  earliest 
triumphs  of  Chantrey  —  an  exquisite  sem- 
blance of  sleeping  innocence  and  heavenly 
purity  1  —  and  the  latter  was  his  last.  Near 
by  is  placed  one  of  the  most  sumptuous  mon- 
uments in  England,  a  recumbent  statue, 
done  by  the  master-hand  of  Watts,  the 
painter,  presenting  Bishop  Lonsdale,  who 
died  in  1867.  This  figure,  in  which  the  mod- 
elling is  very  beautiful  and  expressive,  rests 
upon  a  bed  of  marble  and  alabaster.  In 
Chantrey' s  statue  of  Bishop  Ryder,  which 
seems  no  effigy  but  indeed  the  living  man, 
there  is  marvellous  perfection  of  drapery  — 
the  marble  having  the  effect  of  flowing  silk. 
Here  also,  in  the  south  transept,  is  the  urn 
of  the  Gastrells,  formerly  of  Stratford-upon- 
Avon,  to  whom  was  due  the  destruction 
(1759)  of  the  house  of  New  Place  in  which 

1  Chantrey  had  seen  the  beautiful  sculpture  of 
little  Penelope  Boothby,  in  Ashbourne  church, 
Derbyshire,  made  by  Banks,  and  he  may  well  have 
been  inspired  by  the  specUicle. 


214       THE    HOME    OF    DR.  JOHNSON. 

Shakespeare  died.  No  mention  of  the  Rev. 
Gastrell  occurs  in  the  epitaph,  but  copi- 
ous eulogium  is  lavished  on  his  widow, 
botli  in  verse  and  prose,  and  she  must 
indeed  have  been  a  good  woman  if  the  line 
is  true  which  describes  her  as  "  A  friend  to 
want  when  each  false  friend  withdrew." 
Her  chief  title  to  remembrance,  however, 
like  that  of  her  husband,  is  an  mihallowed 
association  with  one  of  the  most  sacred  of 
literary  shrines.  In  1776  Johnson,  accom- 
panied by  Boswell,  visited  Lichfield,  and 
Bos  well  records  that  they  dined  with  Mrs. 
Gastrell  and  her  sister  Mrs.  Aston.  The 
Rev.  Mr.  Gastrell  was  then  dead.  "I  was 
not  informed  till  afterward,"  says  Boswell, 
"that  Mrs.  Gastrell' s  husband  was  the 
clergyman  who,  while  he  lived  at  Stratford- 
upon-Avon,  with  Gothic  barbarity  cut  down 
Shakespeare's  mulberry -tree,  and  as  Dr. 
Johnson  told  me,  did  it  to  vex  his  neigh- 
bours. His  lady,  I  have  reason  to  believe, 
on  the  same  authority,  participated  in  the 
guilt  of  what  the  enthusiasts  of  our  immor- 
tal bard  deem  almost  a  species  of  sacrilege." 
The  destruction  of  the  house  followed  close 
upon  that  of  the  tree,  and  to  both  their 
deaths  the  lady  was  doubtless  accessary. 
Upon  the  ledge  of  a  casement  on  the  east 


THE    HOME    OF    DR.   JOHNSON.        215 

side  of  the  chancel,  separated  by  the  central 
lancet  of  a  threefold  window,  stand  the 
marble  busts  of  Samuel  Johnson  and  David 
Garrick.  Side  by  side  they  went  through 
life  ;  side  by  side  their  ashes  repose  in  the 
great  abbey  at  Westminster  ;  and  side  by 
side  they  are  commemorated  here.  Both 
the  busts  were  made  by  Westmacott,  and 
obviously  each  is  a  portrait.  The  head  of 
Johnson  appears  without  his  customary  wig. 
The  colossal  individuality  of  the  man  plainly 
declares  itself  in  form  and  pose,  in  every 
line  of  the  eloquent  face  and  in  the  superb 
dignity  of  the  figure  and  the  action.  This 
work  was  based  on  a  cast  taken  after  death, 
and  this  undoubtedly  is  Johnson's  self.  The 
head  is  massive  yet  graceful,  denoting  a 
compact  brain  and  great  natural  refinement 
of  intellect.  The  brow  is  indicative  of  un- 
common sweetness.  The  eyes  are  finely 
shaped.  The  nose  is  prominent,  long,  and 
slightly  aquiline,  with  wide  and  sensitive 
nostrils.  The  mouth  is  large,  and  the  lips 
are  slightly  parted,  as  if  in  speech.  Pro- 
digious perceptive  faculties  are  shown  in 
the  sculpture  of  the  forehead  —  a  feature 
that  is  characteristic,  in  even  a  greater 
degree,  of  the  bust  of  Garrick.  The  total 
expression  of  the  countenance  is  benignant, 


2l6       THE    HOME   OF    DR.  JOHNSON. 

yet  troubled  and  rueful.  It  is  a  thought- 
ful and  venerable  face,  and  yet  it  is  the 
passionate  face  of  a  man  who  has  passed 
through  many  storms  of  self-conflict  and 
been  much  ravaged  by  spiritual  pain.  The 
face  of  Garrick,  on  the  contrary,  is  eager, 
animated,  triumphant,  happy,  showing  a 
nature  of  absolute  simplicity,  a  sanguine 
temperament,  and  a  mind  that  tempests 
may  have  ruffled  but  never  convulsed. 
Garrick  kept  his  "storm  and  stress"  for 
his  tragic  performances  ;  there  was  no  par- 
ticle of  it  in  his  personal  experience.  It 
was  good  to  see  those  old  friends  thus 
associated  in  the  beautiful  church  that  they 
knew  and  loved  in  the  sweet  days  when  their 
friendship  had  just  begun  and  their  labours 
and  their  honours  were  all  before  them.  I 
placed  myself  where,  during  the  service,  I 
could  look  upon  both  the  busts  at  once  ;  and 
presently,  in  the  deathlike  silence,  after  the 
last  amen  of  evensong  had  died  away,  I  could 
well  believe  that  those  familiar  figures  were 
kneeling  beside  me,  as  so  often  they  must 
have  knelt  beneath  this  glorious  and  vener- 
able roof :  and  for  one  worshipper  at  least 
the  beams  of  the  westering  sun,  that  made  a 
solemn  splendour  through  the  church,  illu- 
mined visions  no  mortal  eyes  could  see. 


THE    HOME    OF    DR.  JOHNSON.        217 

Beneath  the  bust  of  Johnson,  upon  a 
stone  slab  affixed  to  the  wall,  appears  this 
inscription  :  — 

The  friends  of  SAMUEL  JOHNSON,  LL.D,, 
a  native  of  Lichfield,  erected  this  monument 
as  a  tribute  of  respect  to  the  memory  of  a  man 
of  extensive  learning,  a  distinguished  moral 
writer  and  a  sincere  Christian.  He  died  the 
13th  of  December  1784,  aged  75  years. 

A  similar  stone  beneath  the  bust  of  Gar- 
rick  is  inscribed  as  follows  :  — 

Eva  Maria,  relict  of  DAVH)  GARRICK, 
Esq.,  caused  this  monument  to  be  erected  to 
the  memory  of  her  beloved  husband,  who  died 
the  20th  of  January  1779,  aged  63  years.  He 
had  not  only  the  amiable  qualities  of  private 
life,  but  such  astonishing  dramatick  talents  as 
too  well  verified  the  observation  of  his  friend  : 
"  His  death  eclipsed  the  gayety  of  nations  and 
impoverished  the  publick  stock  of  harmless 
pleasure." 

This  "observation"  is  the  well-known 
eulogium  of  Johnson,  who,  however  much 
he  may  have  growled  about  Garrick,  always 
loved  him  and  deeply  mourned  for  him. 
These  memorials  of  an  author  and  an  actor 
are  not  rendered  the  more  impressive  by 
being  surmounted,  as  at  present  they  are, 


2l8        THE    HOME    OF    DR.   JOHNSON. 

in  Lichfield  cathedral,  with  old  battle-flags 
—  commemorative  souvenirs  of  the  80th 
Eegiment,  Staffordshire  volunteers — hon- 
ourable and  interesting  relics  in  their  place, 
but  inappropriate  to  the  effigies  of  Johnson 
and  Garrick. 

The  house  in  w^hich  Johnson  was  born 
stands  at  the  corner  of  Market  street  and 
Breadmarket  street,  facing  the  little  Mar- 
ket Place  of  Lichfield.  It  is  an  antiquated 
building,  three  stories  in  height,  having  a 
long,  peaked  roof.  The  lower  story  is  re- 
cessed, so  that  the  entrance  is  sheltered  by 
a  pent.  Its  two  doors  —  for  the  structure 
now  consists  of  two  tenements  —  are  ap- 
proached by  low  stone  steps,  guarded  by  an 
iron  rail.  There  are  ten  windows,  five  in 
each  row,  in  the  front  of  the  upper  stories. 
The  pent-roof  is  supported  by  three  sturdy 
pillars.  The  house  has  a  front  of  stucco. 
A  bill  in  one  of  the  lower  windows  certifies 
that  now  this  house  is  "To  Let."  Here 
old  Michael  Johnson  kept  his  bookshop,  in 
the  days  of  good  Queen  Anne,  and  from 
this  door  young  Samuel  Johnson  went  forth 
to  his  school  and  his  play.  The  whole 
various,  pathetic,  impressive  story  of  his 
long,  laborious,  sturdy,  beneficent  life  drifts 
through  your  mind  as  you  stand  at  that 


THE    HOME    OF    DR.   JOHNSON.        2I9 

threshold  and  conjure  up  the  pictures  of 
the  past.  Opposite  to  the  house,  and  fac- 
ing it,  is  the  statue  of  Johnson  presented 
to  Lichfield  in  1838  by  James  Thomas  Low, 
then  Chancellor  of  the  diocese.  On  the 
sides  of  its  massive  pedestal  are  sculptures, 
showing  first  the  boy,  borne  on  his  father's 
shoulders,  listening  to  the  preaching  of  Dr. 
Sacheverell ;  then  the  youth,  victorious  in 
school,  carried  aloft  in  triumph  by  his 
admiring  comrades ;  and,  finally,  the  re- 
nowned scholar  and  author,  in  the  meridian 
of  his  greatness,  standing  bareheaded  in 
the  market-place  of  Uttoxeter,  doing  pen- 
ance for  his  undutiful  refusal,  when  a  lad, 
to  relieve  his  weary,  infirm  father  in  the 
work  of  tending  the  bookstall  at  that  place. 
Every  one  knows  that  touching  story,  and 
no  one  who  thinks  of  it  when  standing  here 
will  gaze  with  any  feeling  but  that  of  rev- 
erence, commingled  with  the  wish  to  lead 
a  true  and  simple  life,  upon  the  noble, 
thoughtful  face  and  figure  of  the  great  mor- 
alist, who  now  seems  to  look  down  with 
benediction  upon  the  scenes  of  his  innocent 
and  happy  youth.  The  statue,  which  is  in 
striking  contrast  with  the  humble  birth- 
place, points  the  expressive  moral  of  a 
splendid  career.     No  tablet  has  yet  been 


220       THE    HOME    OF   DR.  JOHNSON. 

placed  on  the  house  in  which  Johnson  was 
born.  Perhaps  it  is  not  needed.  Yet  surely 
this  place,  if  any  place  on  earth,  ought  to 
be  preserved  and  protected  as  a  literary 
shrine.  Johnson  was  not  a  great  creative 
poet ;  neither  a  Shakespeare,  a  Dryden,  a 
Byron,  or  a  Tennyson  ;  but  he  was  one  of 
the  most  massive  and  majestic  characters 
in  English  literature.  A  superb  example 
of  self-conquest  and  moral  supremacy,  a 
mine  of  extensive  and  diversified  learning, 
an  intellect  remarkable  for  deep  penetra- 
tion and  broad  and  sure  grasp  of  the  great- 
est subjects,  he  exerted,  as  few  men  have 
ever  exerted,  the  original,  elemental  force 
of  genius ;  and  his  immortal  legacy  to  his 
fellow- men  was  an  abiding  influence  for 
good.  The  world  is  better  and  happier 
because  of  him,  and  because  of  the  many 
earnest  characters  and  honest  lives  that  his 
example  has  inspired ;  and  this  cradle  of 
greatness  ought  to  be  saved  and  marked 
for  every  succeeding  generation  as  long  as 
time  endures. 

One  of  the  interesting  features  of  Lich- 
field is  an  inscription  that  vividly  recalls  the 
ancient  strife  of  Roundhead  and  Cavalier, 
two  centuries  and  a  half  ago.  This  is  found 
upon  a  stone  scutcheon,  set  in  the  wall  over 


THE   HOME    OF    DR.   JOHNSON.        221 

the  door  of  the  house  that  is  No,  24  Dam 
street,  and  these  are  its  words  :  —  "  March 
2d,  1643,  Lord  Brooke,  a  General  of  the 
Tarliament  Forces  preparing  to  Besiege  the 
Close  of  Lichfield,  then  garrisoned  For 
King  Charles  the  First,  Received  his  death- 
wound  on  the  spot  Beneath  this  Liscription, 
By  a  shot  in  the  forehead  from  Mr.  Dyott, 
a  gentleman  who  had  placed  himself  on  the 
Battlements  of  the  great  steeple,  to  annoy 
the  Besiegers."  One  of  them  he  must 
have  "annoyed"  seriously.  It  was  "a 
long  shot,  Sir  Lucius,"  for,  standing  on  the 
place  of  that  catastrophe  and  looking  up  to 
"the  battlements  of  the  great  steeple,"  it 
seemed  to  have  covered  a  distance  of  nearly 
four  hundred  feet.  Other  relics  of  those 
Roundhead  wars  were  shown  in  the  cathe- 
dral, in  an  ancient  room  now  used  for  the 
bishop's  consistory  court  —  these  being  two 
cannon-balls  (fourteen-pounders)  and  the 
ragged  and  rusty  fragments  of  a  shell  that 
were  dug  out  of  the  ground  near  the  church 
a  few  years  ago.  Many  of  these  practical 
tokens  of  Puritan  zeal  have  been  discov- 
ered. Lichfield  cathedral  close,  in  the  time 
of  Bishop  Walter  de  Langton,  who  died  in 
1321,  was  surrounded  with  a  wall  and  fosse, 
and  thereafter  whenever  the  wars  came  it 


222       THE    HOME    OF    DR.  JOHNSON. 

was  used  as  a  fortification.  In  the  Stuart 
times  it  was  often  besieged.  Sir  John  Gell 
succeeded  Lord  Brooke,  when  the  latter 
had  been  shot  by  Mr.  Dyott  —  who  is  said 
to  have  been  "deaf  and  dumb,"  but  who 
certainly  was  not  blind.  The  close  was  sur- 
rendered on  March  5,  1643,  and  thereupon 
the  Parliamentary  victors,  according  to 
their  ruthless  and  brutal  custom,  straight- 
way ravaged  the  church,  tearing  the  brasses 
from  the  tombs,  breaking  the  effigies,  and 
utterly  despoiling  beauty  which  it  had  taken 
generations  of  pious  zeal  and  loving  devo- 
tion to  create.  The  great  spire  was  bat- 
tered down  by  those  vandals,  and  in  falling 
it  wrecked  the  chapter-house.  The  noble 
church,  indeed,  was  made  a  ruin  —  and  so 
it  remained  till  1661,  when  its  munificent 
benefactor.  Bishop  Hackett,  began  its  res- 
toration, now  happily  almost  complete. 
Prince  Eupert  captured  Lichfield  close  for 
the  king  in  April  1643,  and  General  Lothian 
recovered  it  for  the  Parliament  in  the  sum- 
mer of  1646,  after  which  time  it  was  com- 
pletely dismantled.  Charles  I.  came  to  this 
place  after  the  fatal  battle  of  Naseby,  and 
sad  enough  that  picturesque,  vacillating, 
shortsighted,  beatific  aristocrat  must  have 
been,  gazing  over  the  green  fields  of  Lich- 


THE   HOME   OF   DR.   JOHNSON.       223 

field,  to  know  —  as  surely  even  he  must 
then  have  known  —  that  his  cause  was 
doomed,  if  not  entirely  lost. 

It  will  not  take  you  long  to  traverse 
Lichfield,  and  you  may  ramble  all  around  it 
through  little  green  lanes  between  hedge- 
rows. This  you  will  do  if  you  are  wise,  for 
the  walk,  especially  at  evening,  is  peaceful 
and  lovely.  The  wanderer  never  gets  far 
away  from  the  cathedral.  Those  three 
superb  spires  steadily  dominate  the  scene, 
and  each  new  view  of  them  seems  fairer 
than  the  last.  All  around  this  little  city 
the  fields  are  richly  green,  and  many  trees 
diversify  the  prospect.  Pausing  to  rest 
awhile  in  the  mouldering  graveyard  of  old 
St.  Chad's,  I  saw  the  rooks  flocking  home- 
ward to  the  great  tree-tops  not  far  away, 
and  heard  their  many  querulous,  sagacious, 
humorous  croakings,  while  over  the  dis- 
tance, borne  upon  the  mild  and  fragrant 
evening  breeze,  floated  the  solemn  note  of  a 
warning  bell  from  the  minster  tower,  as  the 
shadows  deepened  and  the  night  came 
down.  Scenes  like  this  sink  deep  into  the 
heart,  and  memory  keeps  them  forever. 


224      FROM    LONDON   TO    EDINBURGH. 


XVI. 
FROM    LONDON   TO   EDINBTTRGH. 

EDINBURGH,  September  9,  1889.— 
Scotland  again,  and  never  more  beau- 
tiful than  now  !  The  harvest  moon  is  shin- 
ing upon  the  grim  old  castle,  and  the  bag- 
pipes are  playing  under  my  v^indows 
to-night.  It  has  been  a  lovely  day.  The 
train  rolled  out  of  King's  Cross,  London, 
at  ten  this  morning,  and  it  rolled  into 
Waverley,  Edinburgh,  about  seven  to-night. 
The  trip  by  the  Great  Northern  railway  is 
one  of  the  most  interesting  journeys  that 
can  be  made  in  England.  At  first  indeed 
the  scenery  is  not  striking ;  but  even  at 
first  you  are  whirled  past  spots  of  excep- 
tional historic  and  literary  interest  —  among 
them  the  battlefield  of  Barnet,  and  the  old 
church  and  graveyard  of  Hornsey  where  Tom 
Moore  buried  his  little  daughter  Barbara, 
and  where  the  venerable  poet  Samuel  Rogers 
sleeps  the  last  sleep.  Soon  these  are  gone, 
and  presently,  dashing  through  a  flat  coun- 


FROM    LONDON    TO    EDINBURGH.      225 

try,  you  get  a  clear  view  of  Peterborough 
cathedral,  massive,  dark,  and  splendid,  with 
its  graceful  cone-shaped  pinnacles,  its  vast 
square  central  tower,  and  the  three  great 
pointed  and  recessed  arches  that  adorn  its 
west  front.  This  church  contains  the  dust 
of  Queen  Katherine,  the  Spanish  wife  of 
Henry  VIII.,  who  died  at  Kimbolton  Cas- 
tle, Huntingdonshire,  in  1535 ;  and  there  the 
remains  of  Mary  Stuart  were  first  buried 
(1587), — resting  there  a  long  time  before 
her  son,  James  I. ,  conveyed  them  to  West- 
minster Abbey.  Both  those  queens  were 
buried  by  one  and  the  same  gravedigger  — 
that  famous  sexton,  old  Scarlett,  whose  por- 
trait is  in  the  cathedral,  and  who  died  July 
2,  1591,  aged  ninety-eight. 

The  country  is  so  level  that  the  receding 
tower  of  Peterborough  remains  for  a  long 
time  in  sight,  but  soon,  —  as  the  train  speeds 
through  pastures  of  clover  and  through 
fields  of  green  and  red  and  yellow  herbage, 
divided  by  glimmering  hedges  and  diversi- 
fied with  red-roofed  villages  and  gray  church- 
towers, —  the  land  grows  hilly,  and  long 
white  roads  are  visible  stretching  away  like 
bands  of  silver  over  the  lonely  hill-tops. 
Figures  of  gleaners  are  seen,  now  and  then, 
scattered  throuo-h  fields  whence  the  harvest 


226      FROM   LONDON    TO    EDINBURGH. 

has  lately  been  gathered.  Sheep  are  feed- 
ing in  the  pastures,  and  cattle  are  couched 
under  fringes  of  wood.  The  bright  emerald 
of  the  sod  sparkles  with  the  golden  yellow 
of  the  colt's-foot,  and  sometimes  the  scarlet 
waves  of  the  poppy  come  tumbling  into  the 
plam  like  a  cataract  of  fire.  Windmills 
spread  their  whirling  sails  upon  the  summits 
round  about,  and  over  the  nestling  ivy-clad 
cottages  and  over  the  stately  trees  there  are 
great  flights  of  rooks.  A  gray  sky  broods 
above,  faintly  suffused  with  sunshine,  but 
there  is  no  glare  and  no  heat,  and  often  the 
wind  is  laden  with  a  fragrance  of  wild- 
flowers  and  of  hay. 

It  is  noon  at  Grantham,  where  there  is 
just  time  enough  to  see  that  this  is  a  flourish- 
ing city  of  red-brick  houses  and  fine  spa- 
cious streets,  with  a  lofty,  spired  church, 
and  far  away  eastward  a  high  line  of  hills. 
Historic  Newark  is  presently  reached  and 
passed  —  a  busy,  contented  town,  smihng 
through  the  sunshine  and  mist,  and  as  it 
fades  in  the  distance  I  remember  that  we 
are  leaving  Lincoln,  with  its  glorious  cathe- 
dral, to  the  southeast,  and  to  the  west  New- 
stead  Abbey,  Annesley,  Southwell,  and 
Hucknall-Torkard  —  places  memorably  as- 
sociated with  the  poet  Byron  and  dear  to 


FROM    LONDON    TO   EDINBURGH.       227 

the  heart  of  every  lover  of  poetic  literature. 
At  Markham  the  country  is  exceedingly 
pretty,  with  woods  and  hills  over  which 
multitudes  of  rooks  and  starlings  are  in  full 
career,  dark,  rapid,  and  garrulous.  About 
Bawtry  the  land  is  flat,  and  flat  it  continues 
to  be  until  we  have  sped  a  considerable  way 
beyond  York.  But  in  the  meantime  we 
flash  through  opulent  Doncaster,  famed  for 
manufactories  and  for  horse-races,  rosy  and 
active  amid  the  bright  green  fields.  There 
are  not  many  trees  in  this  region,  and  as 
we  draw  near  Selby  —  a  large  red-brick  city 
upon  the  banks  of  a  broad  river  —  its  mas- 
sive old  church-tower  looms  conspicuous 
under  smoky  skies.  In  the  outskirts  of  this 
town  there  are  cosy  houses  clad  with  ivy,  in 
which  the  pilgrim  might  well  be  pleased  to 
linger.  But  there  is  no  pause,  and  in  a 
little  while  magnificent  York  bursts  upon 
the  view,  stately  and  glorious,  under  a 
black  sky  that  is  full  of  driving  clouds. 
The  minster  stands  out  like  a  mountain, 
and  the  giant  towers  rear  themselves  in 
solemn  majesty  —  the  grandest  piece  of 
church  architecture  in  England  !  The  brim- 
ming Ouse  shines  as  if  it  were  a  stream  of 
liquid  ebony.  The  meadows  around  the 
city  glow  like  living  emeralds,  while   the 


228      FROM   LONDON   TO   EDINBURGH. 

harvest-fields  are  stored  and  teeming  with 
stacks  of  golden  grain.  Great  flights  of 
startled  doves  people  the  air  —  as  white  as 
snow  under  the  sable  fleeces  of  the  driving 
storm.  I  had  seen  York  under  different 
guises,  but  never  before  under  a  sky  at  once 
so  sombre  and  so  romantic. 

We  bear  toward  Thirsk  now,  leaving 
behind  us,  westward  of  our  track,  old 
Ripon,  in  the  distance,  memorable  for  many 
associations,  and  cherished  in  theatrical 
annals  as  the  place  of  the  death  and  burial 
of  the  distinguished  founder  of  the  Jeffer- 
son family  of  actors.  Bleak  Haworth  is 
not  far  distant,  and  remembrance  of  it 
prompts  many  reverent  thoughts  of  the 
strange  genius  of  Charlotte  Bronte.  Dar- 
lington IS  the  next  important  place,  a  town 
of  manufacture,  conspicuous  for  its  tall, 
smoking  chimneys  and  evidently  prosper- 
ous. This  is  the  land  of  stone  walls 
and  stone  cottages  —  the  grim  precinct  of 
Durham.  The  country  is  cultivated,  but 
rougher  than  the  Midlands,  and  the  essen- 
tially diversified  character  of  this  small 
island  is  once  again  impressed  upon  your 
mind.  All  through  this  region  there  are 
little  white -walled  houses  with  red  roofs. 
At  Ferry  Hill  the  scenery  changes  again  and 


FROM    LONDON   TO    EDINBURGH.      229 

becomes  American  —  a  mass  of  rocky  gorges 
and  densely  wooded  ravines.  All  trace  of 
storm  has  vanished  by  this  time,  and  when, 
after  a  brief  interval  of  eager  expectation, 
the  noble  towers  of  Durham  cathedral 
sweep  into  the  prospect,  that  suburb  monu- 
ment of  ancient  devotion,  together  with  all 
the  dark  gray  shapes  of  that  pictorial  city 
—  so  magnificently  placed,  in  an  abrupt 
precipitous  gorge,  on  both  sides  of  the 
brimming  Weir  —  are  seen  under  a  sky  of 
the  softest  Italian  blue,  dappled  with  white 
clouds  of  drifting  fleece.  Durham  is  all  too 
quickly  passed  —  fading  away  in  a  land- 
scape sweetly  mellowed  by  a  faint  blue 
mist.  Then  stately  rural  mansions  are  seen, 
half  hidden  among  great  trees.  Wreaths  of 
smoke  curl  upward  from  scattered  dwell- 
ings all  around  the  circle  of  the  hills.  Each 
distant  summit  is  seen  to  be  crowned  with 
a  tower  or  a  town.  A  fine  castle  springs 
into  view  just  before  Birtley  glances  by, 
and  we  see  that  this  is  a  place  of  wood- 
lands, piquant  with  a  little  of  the  roughness 
of  unsophisticated  nature.  But  the  scene 
changes  suddenly,  as  in  a  theatre,  and  al- 
most in  a  moment  the  broad  and  teeming 
Tyne  blazes  beneath  the  scorching  summer 
sun,  and  the  gray  houses  of  Gateshead  and 


230      FROM   LONDON    TO    EDINBURGH. 

Newcastle  fill  the  picture  with  life  and 
motion.  The  waves  glance  and  sparkle  — 
a  wide  plain  of  shimmering  silver.  The 
stream  is  alive  with  shipping.  There  is 
movement  everywhere,  and  smoke  and  in- 
dustry and  traffic  —  and  doubtless  noise, 
though  we  are  on  a  height  and  cannot  hear 
it.  A  busier  scene  could  not  be  found  in 
all  this  land,  nor  one  more  strikingly  repre- 
sentative of  the  industrial  character  and 
interests  of  England. 

After  leaving  Newcastle  we  glide  past  a 
gentle,  winding  ravine,  thickly  wooded  on 
both  its  sides,  with  a  bright  stream  glanc- 
ing in  its  depth.  The  meadows  all  around 
are  green,  fresh,  and  smiling,  and  soon  our 
road  skirts  by  beautiful  Morpeth,  bestrid- 
ing a  dark  and  lovely  river  and  crouched  in 
a  bosky  dell.  At  Widdrington  the  land 
shelves  downward,  the  trees  become  sparse, 
and  you  catch  a  faint  glimpse  of  the  sea  — 
the  broad  blue  wilderness  of  the  Northern 
Ocean.  From  this  point  onward  the  pano- 
rama is  one  of  perfect  and  unbroken  loveli- 
ness. Around  you  are  spacious  meadows 
of  fern,  diversified  with  clumps  of  fir-trees, 
and  the  sweet  wind  that  blows  upon  your 
face  seems  glad  and  buoyant  with  its  exult- 
ant vitality.      At  Warkworth   Castle  the 


FROM    LONDON   TO    EDINBURGH.       23 1 

ocean  view  is  especially  magnificent — the 
brown  and  red  sails  of  the  ships  and  vari- 
ous craft  descried  at  sea  contributing  to 
the  prospect  a  lovely  element  of  pictur- 
esque character.  Alnwick,  with  its  storied 
associations  of  ' '  the  Percy  out  of  North- 
umberland," is  left  to  the  westward,  while 
on  the  east  the  romantic  village  of  Aln- 
mouth  woos  the  traveller  with  an  irre- 
sistible charm.  No  one  who  has  once 
seen  that  exquisite  place  can  ever  be  con- 
tent without  seeing  it  again  —  and  yet  there 
is  no  greater  wisdom  in  the  conduct  of  life 
than  to  avoid  forever  a  second  sight  of  any 
spot  where  you  have  once  been  happy.  This 
village,  with  its  little  lighthouse  and  grace- 
ful steeple,  is  built  upon  a  promontory  in 
the  sea,  and  is  approached  over  the  sands 
by  a  long,  isolated  road  across  the  bridge 
of  four  fine  arches.  All  the  country-side 
in  this  region  is  rich.  At  Long  Houghton 
a  grand  church  uprears  its  vast  square 
tower,  lonely  and  solemn  in  its  place  of 
graves.  Royal  Berwick  comes  next,  stately 
and  serene  upon  its  ocean  crag,  with  the 
white-crested  waves  curling  on  its  beach 
and  the  glad  waters  of  the  Tweed  kissing 
the  fringes  of  its  sovereign  mantle  as  they 
rush  into  the  sea.     The  sun  is  sinking  now. 


232       FROM    LONDON   TO   EDINBURGH. 

and  over  the  many-coloured  meadows,  red 
and  brown  and  golden  and  green,  the  long, 
thin  shadows  of  the  trees  slope  eastward 
and  softly  hint  the  death  of  day.  The 
sweet  breeze  of  evening  stirs  the  long 
grasses,  and  on  many  a  gray  stone  house 
shakes  the  late  pink  and  yellow  roses  and 
makes  the  ivy  tremble.  It  is  Scotland  now, 
and  as  we  pass  through  the  storied  Border 
we  keep  the  ocean  almost  constantly  in 
view  —  losing  it  for  a  little  while  at  Dun- 
bar, but  finding  it  again  at  Drem  —  till,  past 
the  battlefield  of  Prestonpans  and  past  the 
quaint  villages  of  Cockenzie  and  Mussel- 
burgh and  the  villas  of  Portobello,  we  come 
slowly  to  a  pause  in  the  shadow  of  Arthur's 
Seat,  where  the  great  lion  crouches  over 
the  glorious  city  of  Edinburgh. 


INTO    THE    HIGHLANDS.  233 


XVII. 

INTO    THE    HIGHLANDS. 

LOCH  AWE,  September  14,  1889.  — 
Under  a  soft  gray  sky,  and  through 
fields  that  still  are  slumbering  in  the  early 
morning  mist,  the  train  rolls  out  of  Edin- 
burgh, bound  to  the  north.  The  wind  blows 
gently  ;  the  air  is  cool ;  strips  of  thin,  fleecy 
cloud  are  driving  over  the  distant  hill-tops, 
and  the  birds  are  flying  low.  The  track  is 
by  Queensferry,  and  in  that  region  many 
little  low  stone  cottages  are  seen,  surrounded 
with  simple  gardens  of  flowers.  For  a  long 
time  the  train  runs  through  a  deep  ravine, 
with  rocky  banks  on  either  hand,  but  pres- 
ently it  emerges  into  pastures  where  the 
sheep  are  grazing,  and  into  fields  in  which 
the  late  harvest  stands  garnered  in  many 
graceful  sheaves.  Tall  chimneys,  vigorously 
smoking,  are  visible  here  and  there  in 
the  distant  landscape.  The  fat,  black  rooks 
are  taking  their  morning  flight,  clamouring 
as  they  go.     Stone  houses  with  red  roofs 


234  INTO    THE    HIGHLANDS. 

glide  into  the  picture,  and  a  graceful  churcli- 
spire  rises  on  a  remote  hill-top.  In  all 
directions  there  are  trees,  but  they  seem  of 
recent  growth,  for  no  one  of  them  is  large. 
Soon  the  old  cattle-market  town  of  Falkirk 
springs  up  in  the  prospect,  girt  with  fine 
hills  and  crested  with  masses  of  white  and 
black  smoke  that  is  poured  upward  from  the 
many  tall  chimneys  of  its  busy  ironworks. 
The  houses  here  are  made  of  gray  stone  and 
of  red  brick,  and  many  of  them  are  large, 
square  buildings,  seemingly  commodious  and 
opulent.  A  huge  cemetery,  hemmed  in  with 
trees  and  shrubs,  is  seen  to  skirt  the  city. 
Carron  River,  with  its  tiny  but  sounding 
cataract,  is  presently  passed,  and  at  Larbert 
your  glance  rests  lovingly  upon  "the  little 
gray  church  on  the  windy  hill."  North  of 
this  place,  beyond  the  Forth,  the  country  in 
the  distance  is  mountainous,  while  all  the 
intermediate  region  is  rich  with  harvest- 
fields.  Kinnaird  lies  to  the  eastward,  while 
northward  a  little  way  is  the  famous  field 
of  Bannockburn.  Two  miles  more  and  the 
train  pauses  in  "gray  Stirling,"  glorious 
with  associations  of  historic  splendour  and 
ancient  romance.  Tlie  Castle  of  Stirling  is 
not  as  ruggedly  grand  as  that  of  Edinburgh, 
but  it  is  a  noble  architectural  pile,  and  it  is 


INTO   THE    HIGHLANDS.  235 

nobly  placed  on  a  great  crag  fronting  tlie 
vast  mountains  and  the  gloomy  heavens  of 
the  north.  The  best  view  of  it  is  obtained 
looking  at  it  soutliward,  and  as  I  gazed 
upon  it,  under  the  cold  and  frowning  sky, 
the  air  was  populous  with  many  birds  that 
circled  around  its  cone-shaped  turrets,  and 
hovered  over  the  plain  below,  while  across 
the  distant  mountain-tops,  east,  west,  and 
north,  dark  and  ragged  masses  of  mist  were 
driven  in  wild,  tempestuous  flight.  Speed- 
ing onward  now,  along  the  southern  bank 
of  the  Forth,  the  traveller  takes  a  westerly 
course,  past  Gargunnock  and  Kippen,  see- 
ing little  villages  of  gray  stone  cottages 
nestled  in  the  hill-gaps,  distant  mountain- 
sides, clad  with  furze,  dark  patches  of 
woodland,  and  moors  of  pui-ple  heather  com- 
mingled with  meadows  of  brilliant  green. 
The  smi  breaks  out,  for  a  few  moments, 
and  the  sombre  hue  of  the  gray  sky  is  light- 
ened with  streaks  of  gold.  At  Bucklyvie 
there  is  a  second  pause,  and  then  the  course 
is  northwest,  through  banks  and  braes  of 
heather,  to  peaceful  Aberfoyle  and  the 
mountains  of  Menteith. 

The  characteristic  glory  of  the  Scottish 
hills  is  the  infinite  variety  and  beauty 
of  their  shapes  and  the  loveliness  of  their 


236  INTO    THE    HIGHLANDS. 

colour.  The  English  mountains  and  lakes 
in  Westmoreland  and  Cumberland  possess 
a  sweeter  and  softer  grace,  and  are  more 
calmly  and  wooingly  beautiful ;  but  the 
Scottish  mountains  and  lakes  excel  them  in 
grandeur,  majesty,  and  romance.  It  would 
be  presumption  to  undertake  to  describe 
the  solemn  austerity,  the  lofty  and  lonely 
magnificence,  the  bleak,  weird,  haunted 
isolation,  and  the  fairy-like  fantasy  of  this 
poetic  realm  ;  but  a  lover  of  it  may  de- 
clare his  passion  and  speak  his  sense  of  its 
enthralling  and  bewitching  charm.  Sir 
"Walter  Scott's  spirited  and  trenchant  lines 
on  the  emotion  of  the  patriot  sang  them- 
selves over  and  over  in  my  thought,  and 
were  wholly  and  gi-andly  ratified,  as  the  coach 
rolled  up  the  mountain  road,  ever  climbing 
height  after  height,  while  new  and  ever  new 
prospects  continually  unrolled  themselves 
before  delighted  eyes,  on  the  familiar  but 
always  novel  journey  from  Aberfoyle  to 
the  Trosachs.  That  mountain  road,  on  its 
upward  course,  and  during  most  part  of  the 
way,  winds  through  treeless  pastureland, 
and  in  every  direction,  as  your  vision  ranges, 
you  behold  other  mountains  equally  bleak, 
save  for  the  bracken  and  the  heather, 
among  which   the   sheep  wander  and  the 


INTO    THE    HIGHLANDS.  237 

grouse  nestle  in  concealment,  or  whir  away 
on  frightened  wings.  Ben  Lomond,  wrapt 
in  straggling  mists,  was  dimly  visible  far 
to  the  west ;  Ben  A' an  towered  conspicuous 
in  the  foreground ;  and  further  north  Ben 
Ledi  heaved  its  broad  mass  and  rugged 
sides  to  heaven.  Loch  Vennacher,  seen  for 
a  few  moments,  shone  like  a  diamond  set  in 
emeralds,  and  as  we  gazed  we  seemed  to  see 
the  bannered  barges  of  Roderick  Dhu  and 
to  hear  the  martial  echoes  of  "  Hail  to  the 
Chief."  Loch  Achray  glimmered  forth  for 
an  instant  under  the  gray  sky,  as  when  "  the 
small  birds  would  not  sing  aloud"  and  the 
wrath  equally  of  tempest  and  of  war  hung 
silently  above  it  in  one  awful  moment  of  sus- 
pense. There  was  a  sudden  and  dazzling 
vision  of  Loch  Katrine,  and  then  all  prospect 
was  broken,  and,  rolling  down  among  the 
thickly  wooded  dwarf  hills  that  give  the  name 
of  Trosachs  to  this  place,  we  were  lost  in  the 
masses  of  fragrant  foliage  that  girdle  and 
adorn  in  perennial  verdure  the  hallowed 
scene  of  The  Lady  of  the  Lake. 

Loch  Katrine  is  another  Lake  Horicon, 
with  a  grander  environment,  and  this  — like 
all  the  Scottish  lakes  —  has  the  advantage  of 
a  more  evenly  sharp  and  vigorous  air  and 
of  leaden  and   frowning  skies  (in  which, 


238  INTO    THE    HIGHLANDS. 

nevertheless,  there  is  a  peculiar,  penetrating 
light) ,  that  darken  their  waters  and  impart 
to  them  a  dangerous  aspect  that  yet  is 
strangely  beautiful.  As  we  swept  past 
"  Ellen's  Island  "  and  Fitz- James's  "  Silver 
Strand"  I  was  grateful  to  see  them  in  the 
mystery  of  this  gray  light  and  not  in  the 
garish  sunshine.  All  around  this  sweet  lake 
are  the  sentinel  mountains,  —  Ben  Venue 
rising  in  the  south,  Ben  A' an  in  the  east, 
and  all  the  castellated  ramparts  that  girdle 
Glen  Finglas  in  the  north.  The  eye  dwells 
enraptured  upon  the  circle  of  the  hills  ;  but 
by  this  time  the  imagination  is  so  acutely 
stimulated,  and  the  mind  is  so  filled  with 
glorious  sights  and  exciting  and  ennobling 
reflections,  that  the  sense  of  awe  is  tempered 
with  a  pensive  sadness,  and  you  feel  your- 
self rebuked  and  humbled  by  the  final  and 
effectual  lesson  of  man's  insignificance  that 
is  taught  by  the  implacable  vitality  of  these 
eternal  mountains.  It  is  a  relief  to  be 
brought  back  for  a  little  to  common  life, 
and  this  relief  you  find  in  the  landing  at 
Stronachlachar  and  the  ensuing  drive  — 
across  the  narrow  strip  of  the  shire  of 
Stirling  that  intervenes  between  Loch  Ka- 
trine and  Loch  Lomond  —  to  the  port  of  In- 
versnaid.     This  drive  is  through  a  wild  and 


INTO    THE    HIGHLANDS.  239 

picturesque  country,  but  after  the  mountain 
road  from  Aberfoyle  to  the  Trosachs  it  could 
not  well  seem  otherwise  than  calm  —  at  least 
till  the  final  descent  into  the  -vale  of  Invers- 
naid.  From  Inversnaid  there  is  a  short  sail 
upon  the  northern  waters  of  Loch  Lomond 

—  forever  haunted  by  the  shaggy  presence 
of  Rob  Roy  and  the  fierce  and  terrible  image 
of  Helen  Macgregor  —  and  then,  landing  at 
Ardlui,  you  drive  past  Inverarnan  and  hold 
a  northern  course  to  Crianlarich,  travers- 
ing the  vale  of  the  Falloch  and  skirting 
along  the  western  slope  of  the  grim  and 
gloomy  Grampians  —  on  which  for  miles  and 
miles  no  human  habitation  is  seen,  nor  any 
living  creature  save  the  vacant,  abject  sheep. 
The  mountains  are  everywhere  now,  brown 
with  bracken  and  purple  with  heather, 
stony,  rugged,  endless,  desolate,  and  still 
with  a  stillness  that  is  awful  in  its  pitiless 
sense  of  inhumanity  and  utter  isolation. 
At  Crianlarich  the  railway  is  found  again, 
and  thence  you  whirl  onward  through  lands 
of  Breadalbane  and  Argyle  to  the  proud 
mountains  of  Glen  Orchy  and  the  foot  of  that 
loveliest  of  all  the  lovely  waters  of  Scotland 

—  the  ebony  crystal  of  Loch  Awe.  The 
night  is  deepening  over  it  as  I  write  these 
words.    The  dark  and  solemn  mountains 


240  INTO    THE    HIGHLANDS. 

that  guard  it  stretch  away  into  the  myste- 
rious distance  and  are  lost  in  the  sliuddering 
gloom.  The  gray  clouds  have  drifted  by, 
and  the  cold,  clear  stars  of  autumnal  heaven 
are  reflected  in  its  crystal  depth,  unmarred 
by  even  the  faintest  ripple,  upon  its  surface. 
A  few  small  boats,  moored  to  anchored 
buoys,  float  motionless  upon  it  a  little 
way  from  shore.  There,  on  its  lonely 
island,  dimly  visible  in  the  fading  light, 
stands  the  gray  ruin  of  Kilchurn.  A  faint 
whisper  comes  from  the  black  woods  that 
fringe  the  mountain  base,  and  floating  from 
far  across  this  lonely,  haunted  water  there 
is  a  drowsy  bird-note  that  calls  to  silence 
and  to  sleep. 


HIGHLAND   BEAUTIES.  24 1 


XVIII. 
HIGHLAND    BEAUTIES. 

OBAN,  September  17, 1889.  —  Seen  in  the 
twilight,  as  I  first  saw  it,  Oban  is  a 
pretty  and  picturesque  seaside  village,  gay 
with  glancing  lights  and  busy  with  the 
movements  of  rapid  vehicles  and  expedi- 
tious travellers.  It  is  called  the  capital  of 
the  Western  Highlands,  and  no  doubt  it 
deserves  the  name,  for  it  is  the  common 
centre  of  all  the  trade  and  enterprise  of  this 
region,  and  all  the  threads  of  travel  radiate 
from  it.  Built  in  a  semicircle,  along  the 
margin  of  a  lovely  sheltered  bay,  it  looks 
forth  upon  the  wild  waters  of  the  Firth  of 
Lorn,  visible,  southwesterly,  through  the 
sable  sound  of  Kerrera,  while  behind  and 
around  it  rises  a  bold  range  of  rocky  and 
sparsely  wooded  hills.  On  these  are  placed 
a  few  villas,  and  on  a  point  toward  the 
north  stand  the  venerable,  ivy-clad  ruins  of 
Dunolly  Castle,  m  the  ancestral  domain  of 
the  ancient  Highland  family  of  Macdougall. 


242  HIGHLAND    BEAUTIES. 

The  houses  of  Oban  are  built  of  gray  stone 
and  are  mostly  modern.  There  are  many 
hotels  fronting  upon  the  Parade,  which  ex- 
tends for  a  long  distance  upon  the  verge  of 
the  sea.  The  opposite  shore  is  Kerrera,  an 
island  about  a  mile  distant,  and  beyond 
that  island,  and  beyond  Lorn  water,  ex- 
tends the  beautiful  island  of  Mull,  con- 
fronting iron-ribbed  Morven.  In  many 
ways  Oban  is  suggestive  of  an  American 
seaport  upon  the  New  England  coast. 
Various  characteristics  mark  it  that  may 
be  seen  at  Gloucester,  Massachusetts  (al- 
though that  once  romantic  place  has  been 
spoiled  by  the  Irish  peasantry),  and  at 
Mount  Desert  in  Maine.  The  surround- 
ings, indeed,  are  different ;  for  the  Scottish 
hills  have  a  delicious  colour  and  a  wildness 
all  their  own  ;  while  the  skies,  unlike  those 
of  blue  and  brilliant  America,  lower  and 
gloom  and  threaten,  and  tinge  the  whole 
world  beneath  them  —  the  moors,  the  momi- 
tains,  the  clustered  gray  villages,  the  lonely 
ruins,  and  the  tumbling  plains  of  the  deso- 
late sea  —  with  a  melancholy,  romantic, 
shadowy  darkness,  the  perfect  twilight  of 
poetic  vision.  No  place  could  be  more 
practical  than  Oban  is,  in  its  everyday  life, 
nor  any  place  more  sweet  and  dreamlike  to 


HIGHLAND    BEAUTIES.  243 

the  pensive  mood  of  contemplation  and  the 
roving  gaze  of  fancy.  Viewed,  as  I  viewed 
it,  under  the  starlight  and  the  drifting 
cloud,  between  two  and  three  o'clock  this 
morning,  it  was  a  picture  of  beauty,  never 
to  be  forgotten.  A  few  lights  were  twin- 
kling here  and  there  among  the  dwellings, 
or  momentarily  flaring  on  the  deserted  Pa- 
rade. No  sound  was  heard  but  the  moan- 
ing of  the  night-wind  and  the  plash  of 
waters  softly  surging  on  the  beach.  Now 
and  then  a  belated  passenger  came  wan- 
dering along  the  pavement  and  disappeared 
in  a  turn  of  the  road.  The  air  was  sweet 
with  the  mingled  fragrance  of  the  heathery 
hills  and  the  salt  odours  of  the  sea.  Upon 
the  glassy  bosom  of  the  bay  —  dark,  clear, 
and  gently  undulating  with  the  pressure  of 
the  ocean  tide  —  more  than  seventy  small 
boats,  each  moored  at  a  buoy  and  all  veered 
in  one  direction,  swung  careless  on  the 
water ;  and  mingled  with  them  were  up- 
ward of  twenty  schooners  and  little  steam- 
boats, all  idle  and  all  at  peace.  Many  an 
hour  of  toil  and  sorrow  is  yet  to  come  be- 
fore the  long,  strange  journey  of  this  life  is 
ended ;  but  the  memory  of  that  wonderful 
midnight  moment,  alone  with  the  majesty 
of  Nature,  will  be  a  solace  in  the  darkest  of 
them. 


244  HIGHLAND    BEAUTIES. 

The  Highland  journey,  from  first  to  last, 
is  an  experience  altogether  novel  and  pre- 
cious, and  it  is  remembered  with  gratitude 
and  delight.  Before  coming  to  Oban  I  gave 
two  nights  and  days  to  Loch  Awe  —  a  place 
so  beautiful  and  so  fraught  with  the  means 
of  happiness  that  time  stands  still  in  it,  and 
even  "the  ceaseless  vulture"  of  care  and 
regret  ceases  for  a  while  to  vex  the  spirit 
with  remembrance  of  anything  that  is  sad. 
Looking  down  from  the  summit  of  one  of 
the  great  mountains  that  are  the  rich  and 
rugged  setting  of  this  jewel,  I  saw  the 
crumbling  ruin  of  Kilchurn  upon  its  little 
island,  gray  relic  first  of  the  Macgregors 
and  then  of  the  Campbells,  who  dispossessed 
them  and  occupied  their  realm.  It  must 
have  been  an  imperial  residence  once.  Its 
situation  —  cut  off  from  the  mainland  and 
commanding  a  clear  view,  up  the  lake  and 
down  the  valleys,  southward  and  northward 
—  is  superb.  No  enemy  could  approach  it 
unawares,  and  doubtless  the  followers  of 
the  Macgregor  occupied  every  adjacent  pass 
and  were  ambushed  in  every  thicket  on  the 
heights.  Seen  from  the  neighbouring  moun- 
tain-side the  waters  of  Loch  Awe  are  of  such 
crystal  clearness  that  near  some  part  of  the 
shore  the  white  sands  are  visible  in  perfect 


HIGHLAND    BEAUTIES.  245 

outline  beneath  them,  while  all  the  glorious 
eiigirdhng  hills  are  reflected  in  their  still  and 
shining  depth.  Sometimes  the  sun  flashed 
out  and  changed  the  waters  to  liquid  silver, 
lighting  up  the  gray  ruin  and  flooding  the 
mountain  slopes  with  gold  ;  but  more  often 
the  skies  kept  their  sombre  hue,  darkening 
all  beneath  them  with  a  lovely  gloom.  All 
around  were  the  beautiful  hills  of  Glen 
Orchy,  and  far  to  the  eastward  great  waves 
of  white  and  leaden  mist,  slowly  drifting 
in  the  upper  ether,  now  hid  and  now  dis- 
closed the  Olympian  head  of  Ben  Lui  and 
the  tangled  hills  of  Glen  Shirra  and  Glen 
Fyne.  Close  by,  in  its  sweet  vale  of  Sab- 
bath stillness,  was  couched  the  little  town 
of  Dalmally,  sole  reminder  of  the  presence 
of  man  in  these  remote  solitudes,  where 
Nature  keeps  the  temple  of  her  worship,  and 
where  words  are  needless  to  utter  her  glory 
and  her  praise.  All  day  long  the  peaceful 
lake  slumbered  in  placid  beauty  under  the 
solemn  sky  —  a  few  tiny  boats  and  two 
little  steamers  swinging  at  anchor  on  its 
bosom.  All  day  long  the  shadows  of  the 
clouds,  commingled  with  flecks  of  sunshine, 
went  drifting  over  the  mountain.  At  night- 
fall two  great  flocks  of  sheep,  each  attended 
by  the  pensive  shepherd  in  his  plaid,  and 


246  HIGHLAND    BEAUTIES. 

each  guided  and  managed  by  those  wonder- 
fully intelligent  collies  that  are  a  never- fail- 
ing delight  in  these  mountain  lands,  came 
slowly  along  the  vale  and  presently  vanished 
in  Glen  Strae.  Nothing  then  broke  the 
stillness  but  the  sharp  cry  of  the  shepherd's 
dog  and  the  sound  of  many  cataracts,  some 
hidden  and  some  seen,  that  lapse  in  music 
and  fall  in  many  a  mass  of  shattered  silver 
and  flying  spray,  through  deep,  rocky  rifts 
down  the  mountain-side.  After  sunset  a 
cold  wind  came  on  to  blow,  and  soon  the 
heavens  were  clear  and  "  all  the  number  of 
the  stars"  were  mirrored  in  beautiful  Loch 
Awe. 

They  speak  of  the  southwestern  extremity 
of  this  lake  as  the  head  of  it.  Loch  Awe 
station,  accordingly,  is  at  its  foot,  near 
Kilchurn.  Nevertheless,  "  where  Macgregor 
sits  is  the  head  of  the  table,"  for  the  foot  of 
the  loch  is  lovelier  than  its  head.  And  yet 
its  head  also  is  lovely,  although  in  a  less 
positive  way.  From  Loch  Awe  station  to 
Ford,  a  distance  of  twenty-six  miles,  you 
sail  in  a  toy  steamboat,  sitting  either  on  the 
open  deck  or  in  a  cabin  of  glass  and  gazing 
at  the  panorama  of  the  hills  on  either  hand, 
some  wooded  and  some  bare,  and  all  mag- 
nificent.   A  little  after  passing  the  mouth 


HIGHLAND    BEAUTIES.  24/ 

of  the  river  Awe,  which  flows  through  the 
black  Pass  of  Brander  and  unites  with  Loch 
Etive,  I  saw  the  double  crest  of  great  Ben 
Cruachan  towering  into  the  clouds  and  visi- 
ble at  intervals  above  them — the  higher  peak 
magnifxcently  bold.  It  is  a  wild  country  all 
about  this  region,  but  here  and  there  you  see 
a  little  hamlet  or  a  lone  farm-house,  and 
among  the  moorlands  the  occasional  figure 
of  a  sportsman  with  his  dog  and  gun.  As  the 
boat  sped  onward  into  the  moorland  district 
the  mountains  became  great  shapes  of  snowy 
crystal,  under  the  sullen  sky,  and  presently 
resolved  into  vast  cloud-shadows,  dimly  out- 
lined against  the  northern  heavens,  and 
seemingly  based  upon  a  sea  of  rolling  vapour. 
The  sail  is  past  Inisdrynich,  the  island  of 
the  Druids,  past  Inishail  and  Inis  Fraoch, 
and  presently  past  the  lovely  ruin  of  Inis- 
chonnel  Castle,  called  also  Ardchonnel, 
facing  southward,  at  the  end  of  an  island 
promontory,  and  covered  thick  with  ivy. 
The  landing  is  at  Ford  Pier,  and  about  one 
mile  from  that  point  you  may  see  a  little 
inn,  a  few  cottages  crumbling  in  pictu- 
resque decay,  and  a  diminutive  kirk,  that 
constitute  the  village  of  Ford  My  purpose 
here  was  to  view  an  estate  close  by  this 
village,  now  owned  by  Henry  Bruce,  Esq., 


248  HIGHLAND    BEAUTIES. 

but  many  years  ago  the  domain  of  Alexander 
Campbell,  an  ancestor  of  my  children,  being 
their  mother's  grandsire ;  and  not  in  all 
Scotland  could  be  found  a  more  romantic 
spot  than  the  glen  by  the  lochside  that  shel- 
ters the  melancholy,  decaying,  haunted  fab- 
ric of  the  old  house  of  Ederline.  Such  a 
poet  as  Edgar  Poe  would  have  revelled  in  that 
place  —  and  well  he  might !  There  is  a  new 
and  grand  mansion  on  higher  ground  in  the 
park,  but  the  ancient  house,  almost  aban- 
doned now,  is  a  thousand  times  more  char- 
acteristic and  interesting  than  the  new  one. 
Both  are  approached  through  a  long,  wind- 
ing avenue,  overhung  with  great  trees  that 
interlace  their  branches  above  it  and  make  a 
cathedral  aisle  ;  but  soon  the  pathway  to  the 
older  house  turns  aside  into  a  grove  of  chest- 
nuts, birches,  and  yews, — winding  under 
vast  dark  boughs  that  bend  like  serpents 
completely  to  the  earth  and  then  ascend 
once  more,  —  and  so  goes  onward  through 
sombre  glades  and  through  groves  of  rho- 
dodendron to  the  levels  of  Loch  Ederline 
and  the  front  of  the  mansion,  now  desolate 
and  half  in  ruins.  It  was  an  old  house  a 
hundred  years  ago.  It  is  covered  with  ivy 
and  buried  among  the  trees,  and  on  its  sur- 
face and  on  the  tree-trunks  around  it  the 


HIGHLAND    BEAUTIES.  249 

lichen  and  the  yellow  moss  have  gathered 
in  rank  luxuriance.  The  waters  of  the 
lake  ripple  upon  a  rocky  landing  almost  at 
its  door.  Here  once  lived  as  proud  a 
Campbell  as  ever  breathed  in  Scotland, 
and  here  his  haughty  spirit  wrought  out 
for  itself  the  doom  of  a  lonely  age  and  a 
broken  heart.  His  grave  is  on  a  little  island 
in  the  lake  —  a  family  burial-ground, i  such 
as  may  often  be  found  on  ancient  seques- 
tered estates  in  the  Highlands  —  where  the 
tall  trees  wave  above  it  and  the  weeds  are 
growing  thick  upon  its  surface,  while  over 
it  the  rooks  caw  and  clamour  and  the  idle 
winds  career,  in  heedless  indifference  that 
is  sadder  even  than  neglect.     So  destiny 

1  On  the  stone  that  marks  this  sepulchre  are  the 
following  inscriptions,  which  may  suitably  be  pre- 
served in  this  chronicle:  — 

Alexander  Campbell  Esquire,  of  Ederline.  Died 
2d  October,  1841.    In  his  76th  year. 

Matilda  Campbell.  Second  daughter  of  William 
Campbell  Esq.,  of  Ederline.  Died  on  the  2l8t  Novr 
1842.     In  her  e'^  year. 

"William  Campbell,  Esq.  of  Ederline.  Died  15"» 
January  1855,  in  his  42°^  year. 

Lachlan  Aderson  Campbell.  His  son.  Died  Jan- 
uary 27'h,  1859.     In  his  S""  year. 

[John  Campbell,  the  eldest  son  of  Alexander, 
died  February  26,  1854,  and  is  buried  in  the  Necrop- 
olis, at  Toronto,  Canada.! 


250  HIGHLAND    BEAUTIES. 

vindicates  its  inexorable  edict  and  the  great 
law  of  retribution  is  fulfilled.  A  stranger 
sits  in  his  seat  and  rules  in  his  hall,  and  of 
all  the  followers  that  once  waited  on  his 
lightest  word  there  remains  but  a  single  one 
—  aged,  infirm,  and  nearing  the  end  of  the 
long  journey  —  to  scrape  the  moss  from  his 
forgotten  gravestone  and  to  think  sometimes 
of  his  ancient  greatness  and  splendour,  for- 
ever passed  away.  We  rowed  around  Loch 
Ederline  and  looked  down  into  its  black 
waters  (that  in  some  parts  have  never  been 
sounded,  and  are  fabled  to  reach  through  to 
the  other  side  of  the  world),  and  as  our 
oars  dipped  and  plashed  the  timid  moor- 
fowl  scurried  into  the  bushes  and  the  white 
swans  sailed  away  in  haughty  wrath,  while, 
warned  by  gathering  storm-clouds,  multi- 
tudes of  old  rooks  that  long  have  haunted 
the  place  came  flying  overhead,  with  many 
a  querulous  croak,  toward  their  nests  in 
Ederline  grove. 

Back  to  Loch  Awe  station,  and  presently 
onward  past  the  Falls  of  Cruachan  and 
through  the  grim  Pass  Of  Brander  —  down 
which  the  waters  of  the  Awe  rush  in  a  sable 
flood  between  jagged  and  precipitous  cliffs 
for  miles  and  miles  —  and  soon  we  see  the 
bright  waves  of  Loch  Etive  smiling  under  a 


HIGHLAND    BEAUTIES.  25 1 

sunset  sky,  and  the  many  bleak,  brown  hills 
that  fringe  Glen  Lonan  and  range  along  to 
Oban  and  the  verge  of  the  sea.  There  will 
be  an  hour  for  rest  and  thought.  It  seems 
wild  and  idle  to  write  about  these  things. 
Life  in  Scotland  is  deeper,  richer,  stronger 
and  sweeter  than  any  words  could  possibly 
be  that  any  man  could  possibly  expend  upon 
it.  The  place  is  the  natural  home  of  imag- 
ination, romance,  and  poetry.  Thought  is 
grander  here,  and  passion  is  wilder  and 
more  exuberant  than  on  the  velvet  plains 
and  among  the  chaste  and  stately  elms  of 
the  South.  The  blood  flows  in  a  stormier 
torrent  and  the  mind  takes  on  something  of 
the  gloomy  and  savage  majesty  of  those 
gaunt,  barren,  lonely  hills.  Even  Sir  Walter 
Scott,  speaking  of  his  own  great  works 
(which  are  precious  beyond  words,  and  must 
always  be  loved  and  cherished  by  readers 
who  know  what  beauty  is),  said  that  all 
he  had  ever  done  was  to  polish  the  brasses 
that  already  were  made.  This  is  the  soul 
of  excellence  in  British  literature,  and 
this,  likewise,  is  the  basis  of  stability  in 
British  civilisation  —  that  the  country  is 
lovelier  than  the  loveliest  poetry  that  ever 
was  written  about  it  or  ever  could  be  written 
about  it,  and   that  the  land  and  the  life 


252  HIGHLAND    BEAUTIES. 

possess  an  inherent  fascination  for  the 
inhabitants  that  nothing  else  could  supply, 
and  that  no  influence  can  ever  destroy  or 
ever  seriously  disturb.  Democracy  is  rife 
all  over  the  vv^orld,  but  it  will  as  soon  impede 
the  eternal  courses  of  the  stars  as  it  w^ill 
change  the  constitution  or  shake  the  social 
fabric  of  this  realm,  "  Once  more  upon  the 
waters  —  yet  once  more  ! "  Soon  upon  the 
stormy  billows  of  Lorn  I  shall  see  these 
lovely  shores  fade  in  the  distance.  Soon, 
merged  again  in  the  strife  and  tumult  of 
the  commonplace  world,  I  shall  murmur, 
with  as  deep  a  sorrow  as  the  sad  strain  it- 
self expresses,  the  tender  words  of  Scott :  — 

"  Glenorchy's  proud  mountains, 
Kilchiu'n  and  her  towers, 
Glenstrae  and  Glenlyon 
No  longer  are  ours." 


THE    HEART    OF    SCOTLAND.         253 


XIX. 

THE    HEART   OF   SCOTLAND. 

*'  The  Heart  of  Scotland,  Britain's  other 
e^e."  — Ben  Jonson. 

EDINBURGH,  August  24,  1890.— A 
bright  blue  sky,  across  which  many 
masses  of  tliin  white  cloud  are  borne  swiftly 
on  the  cool  western  wind,  bends  over  the 
stately  city,  and  all  her  miles  of  gray  man- 
sions and  spacious,  cleanly  streets  sparkle 
beneath  it  in  a  flood  of  summer  sunshine. 
It  is  the  Lord's  Day,  and  most  of  the  high- 
ways are  deserted  and  quiet.  From  the  top 
of  the  Calton  Hill  you  look  down  upon  hun- 
dreds of  blue  smoke-wreaths  curling  upward 
from  the  chimneys  of  the  resting  and  rest- 
ful town,  and  in  every  direction  the  pros- 
pect is  one  of  opulence  and  peace.  A 
thousand  years  of  history  are  here  crystal- 
lised within  the  circuit  of  a  single  glance, 
and  while  you  gaze  upon  one  of  the  grand- 
est emblems  that  the  world  contains  of  a 
storied  and  romantic  past,  you  behold  like- 


254  THE    HEART    OF    SCOTLAND. 

wise  a  living  and  resplendent  pageant  of 
the  beauty  of  to-day.  Nowliere  else  are  the 
Past  and  the  Present  so  lovingly  blended. 
There,  in  the  centre,  towers  the  great  crown 
of  St.  Giles.  Hard  by  are  the  quaint  slopes 
of  the  Canongate,  —  teeming  with  illustri- 
ous, or  picturesque,  or  terrible  figures  of 
Long  Ago.  Yonder  the  glorious  Castle 
Crag  looks  steadfastly  westward,  —  its 
manifold,  wonderful  colours  continuously 
changing  in  the  changeful  daylight.  Down 
in  the  valley  Holyrood,  haunted  by  a  myriad 
of  memories  and  by  one  resplendent  face 
and  entrancing  presence,  nestles  at  the  foot 
of  the  giant  Salisbury  Crag ;  while  the 
dark,  rivened  peak  of  Arthur's  Seat  rears 
itself  supremely  over  the  whole  stupendous 
scene.  Southward  and  westward,  in  the 
distance,  extends  the  bleak  range  of  the 
Pentland  Hills  ;  eastward  the  cone  of  Ber- 
wick Law  and  the  desolate  Bass  Rock  seem 
to  cleave  the  sea  ;  and  northward,  beyond 
the  glistening  crystal  of  the  Forth, — with 
the  white  lines  of  embattled  Inchkeith  like 
a  diamond  on  its  bosom,  —  the  lovely 
Lomonds,  the  virginal  mountain  breasts  of 
Fife,  are  bared  to  the  kiss  of  heaven.  It 
is  such  a  picture  as  words  can  but  faintly 
suggest ;   but  when  you  look  upon  it  you 


THE    HEART    OF    SCOTLAND.         255 

readily  comprehend  the  pride  and  the  pas- 
sion with  which  a  Scotsman  loves  his  native 
land. 

Dr.  Johnson  named  Edinburgh  as  "a 
city  too  well  known  to  admit  description." 
That  judgment  was  proclaimed  more  than 
a  hundred  years  ago  —  before  yet  Caledonia 
had  bewitched  the  world's  heart  as  the 
haunted  land  of  Robert  Burns  and  Walter 
Scott  —  and  if  it  were  true  then  it  is  all  the 
more  true  now.  But  while  the  reverent 
pilgrim  along  the  ancient  highways  of  his- 
tory may  not  wisely  attempt  description, 
which  would  be  superfluous,  he  perhaps 
may  usefully  indulge  in  brief  chronicle  and 
impression  —  for  these  sometimes  prove 
suggestive  to  minds  that  are  kindred  with 
his  own.  Hundreds  of  travellers  visit 
Edinburgh  ;  but  it  is  one  thing  to  visit  and 
another  thing  to  see  ;  and  every  suggestion, 
surely,  is  of  value  that  helps  to  clarify  our 
vision.  This  capital  is  not  learned  by  driv- 
ing about  in  a  cab  ;  for  Edinburgh  to  be 
truly  seen  and  comprehended  must  be  seen 
and  comprehended  as  an  exponent  of  the 
colossal  individuality  of  the  Scottish  char- 
acter ;  and  therefore  it  must  be  observed 
with  thought.  Here  is  no  echo  and  no 
imitation.      Many   another  provincial  city 


256  THE    HEART    OF    SCOTLAND. 

of  Britain  in  a  miniature  copy  of  London  ; 
but  the  quality  of  Edinburgh  is  her  own. 
Portions  of  her  architecture  do  indeed 
denote  a  reverence  for  ancient  Italian 
models,  while  certain  other  portions  reveal 
the  influence  of  the  semi-classical  taste  that 
prevailed  in  the  time  of  the  Regent,  after- 
wards George  IV.  The  democratic  ten- 
dency of  this  period  —  expressing  itself  here 
precisely  as  it  does  everywhere  else,  in 
button-making  pettiness  and  vulgar  com- 
monplace—  is  likewise  sufficiently  obvious. 
Nevertheless  in  every  important  detail  of 
Edinburgh,  and  of  its  life,  the  reticent,  res- 
olute, formidable,  impetuous,  passionate 
character  of  the  Scottish  race  is  conspicu- 
ous and  predominant.  Much  has  been 
said  against  the  Scottish  spirit  —  the  tide 
of  cavil  purling  on  from  Dr.  Johnson  to 
Sydney  Smith.  Dignity  has  been  denied 
to  it,  and  so  has  magnanimity,  and  so  has 
humour ;  but  there  is  no  audience  more 
quick  than  the  Scottish  audience  to  respond 
either  to  pathos  or  to  mirth  ;  there  is  no 
literature  in  the  world  so  musically,  ten- 
derly, and  weirdly  poetical  as  the  Scot- 
tish literature  ;  there  is  no  place  on  earth 
where  the  imaginative  instinct  of  the  na- 
tional mind  has  resisted,  as  it  has  resisted 


THE    HEART   OF    SCOTLAND.         257 

in  Scotland,  the  encroachment  of  utility 
upon  the  domain  of  romance  ;  there  is  no 
people  whose  history  has  excelled  that  of 
Scotland  in  the  display  of  heroic,  intellec- 
tual, and  moral  purpose,  combined  with 
passionate  sensibility  ;  and  no  city  could 
surpass  the  physical  fact  of  Edinburgh  as  a 
manifestation  of  broad  ideas,  unstinted 
opulence,  and  grim  and  rugged  grandeur. 
Whichever  way  you  turn,  and  whatever 
object  you  behold,  that  consciousness  is 
always  present  to  your  thought  —  the  con- 
sciousness of  a  race  of  beings  intensely 
original,  individual,  passionate,  authorita- 
tive, and  magnificent. 

The  capital  of  Scotland  is  not  only  beauti- 
ful but  eloquent.  The  present  writer  does 
not  assume  to  describe  it,  or  to  instruct  the 
reader  concerning  it,  but  only  to  declare 
that  at  every  step  the  sensitive  mind  is 
impressed  with  the  splendid  intellect,  the 
individual  force,  and  the  romantic  charm  of 
the  Scottish  character,  as  it  is  commem- 
orated and  displayed  in  this  delightful 
place.  What  a  wealth  of  significance  it 
possesses  may  be  indicated  by  even  the  most 
meagre  record  and  the  most  superficial 
commentary  upon  the  passing  events  of 
a  traveller's   ordinary   cLay.      The  greatest 


258  THE    HEART    OF    SCOTLAND. 

name  in  the  literature  of  Scotland  is  Walter 
Scott.  He  lived  and  laboured  for  twenty- 
four  years  in  the  modest  three-story,  gray 
stone  house  which  is  No.  39  Castle  street. 
It  has  been  my  privilege  to  enter  that 
house,  and  to  stand  in  the  room  in  which 
Scott  began  the  novel  of  Waverley.  Many 
years  roll  backward  under  the  spell  of 
such  an  experience,  and  the  gray-haired 
man  is  a  boy  again,  with  all  the  delights  of 
the  Waverley  Novels  before  him,  health 
shining  in  his  eyes,  and  joy  beating  in  his 
heart,  as  he  looks  onward  through  vistas  of 
golden  light  into  a  paradise  of  fadeless 
flowers  and  of  happy  dreams.  The  room 
that  was  Scott's  study  is  a  small  one,  on 
the  first  floor,  at  the  back,  and  is  lighted 
by  one  large  window,  opening  eastward, 
through  which  you  look  upon  the  rear  walls 
of  sombre,  gray  buildings,  and  upon  a  small 
slope  of  green  lawn,  in  which  is  the  un- 
marked grave  of  one  of  Sir  Walter's  dogs. 
"The  misery  of  keeping  a  dog,"  he  once 
wrote,  "is  his  dying  so  soon;  but,  to  be 
sure,  if  he  lived  for  fifty  years  and  then 
died,  what  would  become  of  me?"  My 
attention  was  called  to  a  peculiar  fastening 
on  the  window  of  the  study,  —  invented  and 
placed  there  by  Scott  himself,  —  so  arranged 


THE    HEART    OF    SCOTLAND.  259 

that  the  sash  can  be  safely  kept  locked 
when  raised  a  few  inches  from  the  sill.  On 
the  south  side  of  the  room  is  the  fireplace, 
facing  which  he  would  sit  as  he  wrote,  and 
into  which,  of  an  evening,  he  has  often 
gazed,  hearing  meanwhile  the  moan  of  the 
winter  wind,  and  conjuring  up,  in  the  blaz- 
ing brands,  those  figures  of  brave  knights 
and  gentle  ladies  that  were  to  live  forever 
in  the  amber  of  his  magical  art.  Next  to 
the  study,  on  the  same  floor,  is  the  larger 
apartment  that  was  his  dining-room,  where 
his  portrait  of  Claverhouse  (now  at  Abbots- 
ford)  once  hung  above  the  mantel,  and 
where  so  many  of  the  famous  people  of  the 
past  enjoyed  his  hospitality  and  his  talk. 
On  the  south  wall  of  this  room  now  hang 
two  priceless  autograph  letters,  one  of  them 
in  the  handwriting  of  Scott,  the  other  in 
that  of  Burns.  Both  rooms  are  used  for 
business  offices  now,  —  the  house  being 
tenanted  by  the  agency  of  the  New-Zealand 
Mortgage  Company,  —  and  both  are  fur- 
nished with  large  presses  for  the  custody  of 
deeds  and  family  archives.  Nevertheless 
these  rooms  remain  much  as  they  were 
when  Scott  lived  in  them,  and  his  spirit 
seems  to  haunt  the  place.  I  was  brought 
very  near  to  him  that  day,  for  in  the  same 


20O  THE    HEAKT    OF    t5COTLA2<l>. 

hour  was  placed  in  my  hands  the  original 
manuscript  of  liis  Journal,  and  I  saw,  in 
nis  own  iiandwriting,  the  last  words  that 
ever  fell  from  his  pen.  That  Journal  is 
in  two  quarto  volumes.  One  of  them  is 
filled  with  writing ;  the  other  half  filled ; 
and  the  lines  in  both  are  of  a  fine,  small 
character,  crowded  closely  together.  Toward 
the  last  the  writing  manifests  only  too 
well  the  growing  infirmity  of  the  broken 
Minstrel  —  the  forecast  of  the  hallowed 
deathbed  of  Abbotsford  and  the  venerable 
and  glorious  tomb  of  Dryburgh.  These  are 
his  last  words  :  ' '  We  slept  reasonably,  but 
on  the  next  morning" — and  so  the  Jour- 
nal abruptly  ends.  I  can  in  no  way  express 
the  emotion  with  which  I  looked  upon  those 
feebly  scrawled  syllables  —  the  last  effort 
of  the  nerveless  hand  that  once  had  been 
strong  enough  to  thrill  the  heart  of  all  the 
world.  The  Journal  has  been  lovingly  and 
carefully  edited  by  David  Douglas,  whose 
line  taste  and  great  gentleness  of  nature, 
together  with  his  ample  knowledge  of  Scot- 
tish literature  and  society,  eminently  qualify 
him  for  the  performance  of  this  sacred  duty  ; 
and  the  world  will  possess  this  treasure 
and  feel  the  charm  of  its  beauty  and  pathos 
—  which  is  the  charm  of  a  irreat  nature  ex- 


THE    HEART    OF    SCOTLAND.  261 

pressed  in  its  perfect  simplicity  ;  but  the 
spell  that  is  cast  upon  the  heart  and  the 
imagination  by  a  prospect  of  the  actual 
handwriting  of  Sir  Walter  Scott,  in  the 
last  words  that  he  wrote,  cannot  be  con- 
veyed in  print. 

From  the  house  in  Castle  street  I  went 
to  the  rooms  of  the  Royal  Society,  where 
there  is  a  portrait  of  Scott,  by  John  Gra- 
ham Gilbert,  more  life-like  —  being  repre- 
sentative of  his  soul  as  well  as  his  face  and 
person  —  than  any  other  that  is  known. 
It  hangs  there,  in  company  with  other 
paintings  of  former  presidents  of  this  insti- 
tution, —  notably  one  of  Sir  David  Brews- 
ter and  one  of  James  Watt,  —  in  the  hall 
in  which  Sir  Walter  often  sat,  presiding 
over  the  deliberations  and  literary  exercises 
of  his  comrades  in  scholarship  and  art.  In 
another  hall  I  saw  the  pulpit  in  which  John 
Knox  used  to  preach,  in  the  old  days  of 
what  Dr.  Johnson  expressively  called  ' '  The 
ruffians  of  Reformation,"  and  hard  by  was 
"The  Maiden,"  the  terrible  Scottish  guil- 
lotine, with  its  great  square  knife  set  in  a 
thick  weight  of  lead,  by  which  tlie  grim 
Regent  Morton  w\as  slain  in  1581,  the  Mar- 
quis of  Argyle  in  16(51,  and  the  gallant, 
magnanimous,  devoted  Earl   of  Argyle  in 


262  THE    HEART    OF    SCOTLAND. 

1685  —  one  more  sacrifice  to  the  insatiate 
House  of  Stuart.  This  monster  has  drunk 
the  blood  of  many  a  noble  gentleman,  and 
there  is  a  weird,  sinister  suggestion  of  grati- 
fied ferocity  and  furtive  malignity  in  its 
rude,  grisly,  uncanny  fabric  of  blackened 
timbers.  You  may  see  in  the  quaint  little 
panelled  chapel  of  St.  Mary  Magdalen,  not 
many  steps  distant  from  the  present  abode 
of  the  sanguinary  "  Maiden, "— brooding 
over  her  hideous  consummation  of  slaughter 
and  misery,  —  the  place  where  the  mangled 
body  of  the  heroic  Earl  of  Argyle  was  laid, 
in  secret  sanctuary,  for  several  nights  after 
that  scene  of  piteous  sacrifice  at  the  old 
Market  Cross  ;  and  when  you  w-alk  in  the 
solemn  enclosure  of  the  Greyfriars  church, 
—  so  fitly  styled  by  Sir  Walter  "  The  West- 
minster Abbey  of  Scotland,"  —  your  glance 
will  fall  upon  a  sunken  pillar,  low  down 
upon  the  northern  slope  of  that  hamited, 
lamentable  ground,  which  bears  the  letters 
"  I.  M.,"  and  which  marks  the  grave  of  the 
baleful  Morton,  whom  the  Maiden  decapi- 
tated for  his  share  in  the  murder  of  Kizzio. 
In  these  old  cities  there  is  no  keeping  away 
from  sepulchres.  "  The  paths  of  glory,"  in 
every  sense,  "lead  but  to  the  grave." 
George  Buchanan  and  Allan  Ramsay  (poets 


THE    HEART    OF    SCOTLAND.         263 

whom  no  literary  pilgrim  will  neglect)  rest 
in  this  churchyard,  though  the  exact  places 
of  their  interment  are  not  positively  denoted, 
and  here,  likewise,  rest  the  elegant  historian 
Robertson,  and  "the  Addison  of  Scotland," 
Henry  Mackenzie.  The  building  in  the  High 
street  in  which  Allan  Ramsay  once  had 
his  abode  and  his  bookshop,  and  in  which 
he  wrote  his  pastoral  of  The  Gentle  Shep- 
herd^ is  occupied  now  by  a  barber ;  but 
since  he  is  one  that  scorns  not  to  proclaim 
over  his  door  in  mighty  letters  the  poetic 
lineage  of  his  dwelling  it  seems  not  amiss 
that  this  haunt  of  the  IMuses  should  have 
fallen  into  such  pious  though  lowly  hands. 
Of  such  a  character,  hallowed  with  asso- 
ciations that  pique  the  fancy  and  touch 
the  heart,  are  the  places  and  the  names  that 
an  itinerant  continually  encounters  in  his 
rambles  in  Edinburgh. 

One  could  muse  for  many  an  hour  over 
the  little  Venetian  mirror  that  hangs  in 
the  bedroom  of  Mary  Stuart  in  Holyrood 
Palace.  What  faces  and  what  scenes  it 
must  have  reflected  !  How  often  her  own 
beautiful  countenance  and  person  —  the 
dazzling  eyes,  the  snowy  brow,  the  red  gold 
hair,  the  alabaster  bosom  —  may  have  blazed 
in  its  crystal  depths,  now  tarnished  and  dim, 


264  THE    HEART    OF    SCOTLAND. 

like  Hie  record  of  her  own  calamitous  and 
wretched  days  !  Did  those  lovely  eyes  look 
into  this  mirror  —  and  was  their  glance 
scared  and  tremulous,  or  fixed  and  terrible 
—  on  that  dismal  February  night,  so  many 
years  ago,  when  the  fatal  explosion  in  the 
Kirk  o'  Field  resounded  with  an  echo  that 
has  never  died  away  ?  Who  can  tell  ?  This 
glass  saw  the  gaunt  and  livid  face  of  Euth- 
ven  when  he  led  his  comrades  of  murder 
into  that  royal  chamber,  and  it  beheld  Kiz- 
zio  screaming  in  mortal  terror  as  he  was 
torn  from  the  skirts  of  his  mistress  and 
savagely  slain  before  her  eyes.  Perhaps, 
also,  when  that  hideous  episode  was  over 
and  done  with,  it  saw  Queen  Mary  and  her 
despicable  husband  the  next  time  they  met 
and  were  alone  together  in  that  ghastly 
room.  "  It  shall  be  dear  blood  to  some  of 
you,"  the  queen  had  said,  while  the  mur- 
der of  Kizzio  was  doing.  Surely,  having  so 
injured  a  woman,  any  man  with  eyes  to  see 
might  have  divined  his  fate,  in  the  perfect 
calm  of  her  heavenly  face  and  the  quiet 
tones  of  her  gentle  voice,  at  such  a  moment 
as  that.  "At  the  fireside  tragedies  are 
acted  "  —  and  tragic  enough  must  have  been 
the  scene  of  that  meeting,  apart  from  human 
gaze,  in  the  chamber  of  crime  and  death. 


THE    HEART    OF    SCOTLAND.  265 

No  other  relic  of  Mary  Stuart  stirs  the  im- 
agination as  tliat  mirror  does  —  unless,  per- 
haps, it  be  the  little  ebony  crucifix,  once 
owned  and  reverenced  by  Sir  Walter  Scott 
and  now  piously  treasured  at  Abbotsford, 
which  she  held  in  her  hands  when  she  went 
to  her  death  in  the  hall  of  Fotheringay 
Castle. 

Holyrood  Palace,  in  Mary  Stuart's  time, 
was  not  of  its  present  shape.  The  tower 
containing  her  rooms  was  standing,  and 
from  that  tower  the  building  extended  east- 
ward to  the  abbey,  and  then  it  veered  to  the 
south.  Much  of  this  building  was  destroyed 
by  fire  in  1544,  and  again  in  Cromwell's 
time,  but  both  church  and  palace  were 
rebuilt.  The  entire  south  side,  with  its 
tower  that  looks  directly  towards  the  crag, 
was  added  in  the  later  period  of  Charles  II. 
The  furniture  in  Mary  Stuart's  room  is 
mostly  spurious,  but  the  rooms  are  genuine. 
Musing  thus,  and  much  striving  to  recon- 
struct those  strange  scenes  of  the  past,  in 
which  that  beautiful,  dangerous  woman 
bore  so  great  a  part,  the  pilgrim  strolls 
away  into  the  Cannongate, —  once  clean 
and  elegant,  now  squalid  and  noisome, — 
and  still  the  storied  figures  of  history  walk 
by  his  side  or  come  to  meet  him  at  every 


266  THE    HEART    OF    SCOTLAND. 

close  and  wynd.  John  Knox,  Robert 
Burns,  Tobias  Smollett,  David  Hume, 
Dugald  Stuart,  John  Wilson,  Hugh  Miller  — 
Gay,  led  onward  by  the  blithe  and  gracious 
Duchess  of  Queensberry,  and  Dr.  Johnson, 
escorted  by  the  affectionate  and  faithful 
James  Boswell,  the  best  biographer  that 
ever  lived, —  these  and  many  more,  the  let- 
tered vs^orthies  of  long  ago,  throng  into  this 
haunted  street  and  glorify  it  with  the 
rekindled  splendours  of  other  days.  You 
cannot  be  lonely  here.  This  it  is  that 
makes  the  place  so  eloquent  and  so  precious. 
For  what  did  those  men  live  and  labour  ? 
To  what  were  their  shining  talents  and 
wonderful  forces  devoted  ?  To  the  dissemi- 
nation of  learning ;  to  the  emancipation  of 
the  human  mind  from  the  bondage  of  error  ; 
to  the  ministry  of  the  beautiful  —  and  thus 
to  the  advancement  of  the  human  race  in 
material  comfort,  in  gentleness  of  thought, 
in  charity  of  conduct,  in  refinement  of  man- 
ners, and  in  that  spiritual  exaltation  by 
which,  and  only  by  which,  the  true  progress 
of  mankind  is  at  onoe  accomplished  and 
proclaimed. 

But  the  dark  has  come,  and  this  Edin- 
burgh ramble  shall  end  with  the  picture 
that  closed  its  own  magnificent  day.     You 


THE    HEART    OF    SCOTLAND.  26/ 

are  standing  on  the  rocky  summit  of 
Arthur's  Seat.  From  tliat  superb  mountain 
peak  your  gaze  takes  in  the  wliole  capital, 
together  with  the  country  in  every  direction 
for  many  miles  around.  The  evening  is 
uncommonly  clear.  Only  in  the  west  dense 
masses  of  black  cloud  are  thickly  piled  upon 
each  other,  through  which  the  sun  is  sink- 
ing, red  and  sullen  with  menace  of  the 
storm.  Elsewhere  and  overhead  the  sky  is 
crystal,  and  of  a  pale,  delicate  blue.  A 
cold  wind  blows  briskly  from  the  east  and 
sweeps  a  million  streamers  of  white  smoke 
in  turbulent  panic  over  the  darkening  roofs 
of  the  city,  far  below.  In  the  north  the 
lovely  Lomond  Hills  are  distinctly  visible 
across  the  dusky  level  of  the  Forth,  which 
stretches  away  toward  the  ocean,  one  broad 
sheet  of  glimmering  steel  —  its  margin  in- 
dented with  many  a  graceful  bay,  and  the 
little  islands  that  adorn  it  shining  like  stones 
of  amethyst  set  in  polished  flint.  A  few 
brown  sails  are  visible,  dotting  the  waters, 
and  far  to  the  east  appears  the  graceful  out- 
line of  the  Isle  of  May, —  whicli  was  the 
shrine  of  the  martyred  St.  Adrian,  —  and 
the  lonely,  wave-beaten  Bass  Rock,  with  its 
millions  of  seagulls  and  solan  geese.  Busy 
Leith  and  picturesque  Newhaven  and  every 


205  THE    HEART    OF    SCOTLAND. 

little  village  on  the  coast  is  sharply  defined 
in  the  frosty  light.  At  your  feet  is  St. 
Leonards,  with  the  tiny  cottage  of  Jeanie 
Deans.  Yonder,  in  the  south,  are  the  gray 
ruins  of  Craigmillar  Castle — once  the  favour- 
ite summer  home  of  the  Queen  of  Scots,  now- 
open  to  sun  and  rain,  mossgrown  and  deso- 
late, and  swept  by  every  wind  that  blows. 
More  eastward  the  eye  lingers  upon  Car- 
berry  Hill,  where  Mary  surrendered  herself 
to  her  nobles  just  before  the  romantic  epi- 
sode of  Loch  Leven  Castle  ;  and  far  beyond 
that  height  the  sombre  fields,  intersected  by 
green  hawthorn  hedges  and  many-coloured 
with  the  various  hues  of  pasture  and  har- 
vest, stretch  away  to  the  hills  of  Lammer- 
moor  and  the  valleys  of  Tweed  and  Esk. 
Parker  and  darker  gTow  the  gathering  shad- 
ows of  the  gloaming.  The  lights  begin  to 
twinkle  in  the  city  streets.  The  echoes  of 
the  rifles  die  away  in  the  Hunter's  Bog.  A 
piper  far  off  is  playing  the  plaintive  music 
of  The  Blue  Bells  of  Scotland.  And  as 
your  steps  descend  the  crag  the  rising 
moon,  now  nearly  at  the  full,  shines 
through  a  gauzy  mist  and  hangs  above  the 
mountain  like  a  shield  of  gold  upon  the 
towered  citadel  of  night. 


SIR   WALTER    SCOTT.  269 


XX. 

SIR   WALTER    SCOTT. 

MORE  than  a  century  has  passed  since 
Walter  Scott  was  born  —  a  poet  des- 
tined to  exercise  a  profound,  far-reaching, 
permanent  influence  upon  the  feelings  of  the 
human  race,  and  thus  to  act  a  conspicuous 
part  in  its  moral  and  spiritual  development 
and  guidance.  To  the  greatness  of  his  mind, 
the  nobility  of  his  spirit,  and  the  beauty  of 
his  life  there  is  abundant  testimony  in  his 
voluminous  and  diversified  writings,  and  in 
his  ample  and  honest  biography.  Every- 
body who  reads  has  read  something  from  the 
pen  of  Scott,  or  something  commemorative 
of  him,  and  in  every  mind  to  which  his  name 
is  known  it  is  known  as  the  synonym  of 
great  faculties  and  wonderful  achievement. 
There  must  have  been  enormous  vitality  of 
spirit,  prodigiovis  power  of  intellect,  irresist- 
ible charm  of  personality,  and  lovable  purity 
of  moral  nature  in  the  man  whom  thousands 
that  never  saw  him  living  —  men  and  women 


270  SIR    WALTER    SCOTT. 

of  a  later  age  and  different  countries  —  know 
and  remember  and  love  as  Sir  Walter 
Scott.  Others  have  vs^ritten  greatly.  Milton, 
Dryden,  Addison,  Pope,  Cowper,  Johnson, 
Wordsworth,  Coleridge,  Landor,  —  these 
are  only  a  few  of  the  imperial  names  that 
cannot  die.  But  these  names  live  in  the 
world's  respect.  The  name  of  Scott  lives 
in  its  affection.  What  other  name  of  the 
past  in  English  literature  —  unless  it  be 
that  of  Shakespeare  —  arouses  such  a  deep 
and  sweet  feeling  of  affectionate  interest, 
gentle  pleasure,  gratitude,  and  reverential 
love? 

The  causes  of  Sir  Walter  Scott's  ascend- 
ency are  to  be  found  in  the  goodness  of  his 
heart ;  the  integrity  of  his  conduct ;  the  ro- 
mantic and  picturesque  accessories  and  at- 
mosphere of  his  life  ;  the  fertile  brilliancy  of 
his  literary  execution  ;  the  charm  that  he  ex- 
ercises, both  as  man  and  artist,  over  the 
imagination  ;  the  serene,  tranquillising spirit 
of  his  works  ;  and,  above  all,  the  buoyancy, 
the  happy  freedom,  of  his  genius.  He  was 
not  simply  an  intellectual  power  ;  he  was 
also  a  human  and  gentle  comforter.  He 
wielded  an  immense  mental  force,  but  he 
always  wielded  it  for  good,  and  always  with 
tenderness.     It  is  impossible  to  conceive  of 


SIR   WALTER    SCOTT.  27 1 

his  ever  having  done  a  wrong  act,  or  of  any- 
contact  with  his  influence  that  would  not 
inspire  the  wish  to  be  virtuous  and  noble. 
The  scope  of  his  sympathy  was  as  broad  as 
the  weakness  and  the  need  are  of  the  human 
race.  He  understood  the  hardship,  the 
dilemma,  in  the  moral  condition  of  mankind  : 
he  wished  people  to  be  patient  and  cheerful, 
and  he  tried  to  make  them  so.  His  writings 
are  full  of  sweetness  and  cheer,  and  they 
contain  nothing  that  is  morbid, — nothing 
that  tends  toward  surrender  and  misery. 
He  did  not  sequester  himself  in  mental 
pride,  but  simply  and  sturdily,  through 
years  of  conscientious  toil,  he  employed  the 
faculties  of  a  strong,  tender,  gracious  genius 
for  the  good  of  his  fellow- creatures.  The 
world  loves  him  because  he  is  worthy  to  be 
loved,  and  because  he  has  lightened  the 
burden  of  its  care  and  augmented  the  sum 
of  its  happiness. 

Certain  differences  and  confusions  of 
opinion  have  arisen  from  the  consideration 
of  his  well-known  views  as  to  the  literary 
art,  together  with  his  equally  well-known 
ambition  to  take  and  to  maintain  the  rank 
and  estate  of  a  country  squire.  As  an 
artist  he  had  ideals  that  he  was  never  able 
to  fulfil.     As   a  man,    and   one   who   was 


272  SIR   WALTER    SCOTT. 

influenced  by  imagination,  taste,  patriotism, 
family  pride,  and  a  profound  belief  in  es- 
tablished monarchical  institutions,  it  was 
natural  that  he  should  wish  to  found  a 
grand  and  beautiful  home  for  himself  and 
his  posterity.  A  poet  is  not  the  less  a  poet 
because  he  thinks  modestly  of  his  writings 
and  practically  knows  and  admits  that 
there  is  something  else  in  the  world  beside 
literature ;  or  because  he  happens  to  want 
his  dinner  and  a  roof  to  cover  him.  In 
trying  to  comprehend  a  great  man,  a  good 
method  is  to  look  at  his  life  as  a  whole,  and 
not  to  deduce  petty  inferences  from  the  dis- 
torted interpretation  of  petty  details.  Sir 
Walter  Scott's  conduct  of  life,  like  the 
character  out  of  which  it  sprang,  was  simple 
and  natural.  In  all  that  he  did  you  may 
perceive  the  influence  of  imagination  acting 
upon  the  finest  reason  ;  the  involuntary  con- 
sciousness of  reserve  power  ;  habitual  defer- 
ence to  the  voice  of  duty  ;  an  aspiring  and 
picturesque  plan  of  artistic  achievement  and 
personal  distinction  ;  and  deep  knowledge 
of  the  world.  If  ever  there  was  a  man  who 
lived  to  be  and  not  to  seem,  that  man  was 
Sir  Walter  Scott.  He  made  no  pretensions. 
He  claimed  nothing,  but  he  quietly  and 
earnestly  earned  all.     His  means  were  the 


SIR    WALTER    SCOTT.  273 

oldest  and  the  best ;  self-respect,  hard  work, 
and  fidelity  to  duty.  The  development  of 
his  nature  was  slow,  but  it  was  thorough 
and  it  was  salutary.  He  was  not  ham- 
pered by  precocity  and  he  was  not  spoiled 
by  conceit.  He  acted  according  to  himself, 
honouring  his  individuality  and  obeying  the 
inward  monitor  of  his  genius.  But,  combined 
with  the  delicate  instinct  of  a  gentleman, 
he  had  the  wise  insight,  foresight,  and 
patience  of  a  philosopher  ;  and  therefore  he 
respected  the  individuality  of  others,  the 
established  facts  of  life,  and  the  settled  con- 
ventions of  society.  His  mind  was  neither 
embittered  by  revolt  nor  sickened  by  delu- 
sion. Having  had  the  good  fortune  to  be 
born  in  a  country  in  which  a  right  plan 
of  government  prevails  —  the  idea  of  the 
family  —  the  idea  of  the  strong  central 
power  at  the  head,  with  all  other  powers 
subordinated  to  it, — he  felt  no  impulse 
toward  revolution,  no  desire  to  regulate  all 
things  anew  ;  and  he  did  not  suffer  perturba- 
tion from  the  feverish  sense  of  being  sur- 
rounded with  uncertainty  and  endangered 
by  exposure  to  popular  caprice.  During  the 
period  of  immaturity,  and  notwithstanding 
physical  weakness  and  pain,  his  spirit  was 
kept  equable  and  cheerful,  not  less  by  the 


274  SIR   WALTER    SCOTT. 

calm  environment  of  a  permanent  civilisa- 
tion than  by  the  clearness  of  his  perceptions 
and  the  sweetness  of  his  temperament.  In 
childhood  and  youth  he  endeared  himself  to 
all  who  came  near  him,  winning  affection 
by  inherent  goodness  and  charm.  In  riper 
years  that  sweetness  was  reinforced  by 
great  sagacity,  which  took  broad  views  of 
individual  and  social  life  ;  so  that  both  by 
knowledge  and  by  impulse  he  was  a  serene 
and  happy  man. 

The  quality  that  first  impresses  the  stu- 
dent of  the  character  and  the  writings  of 
Sir  Walter  Scott  is  truthfulness.  He  was 
genuine.  Although  a  poet,  he  suffered  no 
torment  from  vague  aspirations.  Although 
once,  and  miserably,  a  disappointed  lover, 
he  permitted  no  morbid  repining.  Al- 
though the  most  successful  author  of  his 
time,  he  displayed  no  egotism.  To  the  end 
of  his  days  he  was  frank  and  simple  —  not 
indeed  sacrificing  the  reticence  of  a  digni- 
fied, self-reliant  nature,  but  suffering  no 
blight  from  success,  and  wearing  illustrious 
honours  with  spontaneous,  unconscious 
grace.  This  truthfulness  —  the  consequence 
and  the  sign  of  integrity  and  of  great 
breadth  of  intellectual  vision  —  moulded  Sir 
Walter  Scott's  ambition  and  stamped  the 


SIR   WALTER    SCOTT.  275 

practical  results  of  his  career.  A  striking 
illustration  of  this  is  seen  in  his  first  adven- 
ture in  literature.  The  poems  originally 
sprang  from  the  spontaneous  action  of  the 
poetic  impulse  and  faculty  ;  but  they  were 
put  forth  modestly,  in  order  that  the  author 
might  guide  himself  according  to  the  re- 
sponse of  the  public  mind.  He  knew  that 
he  might  fail  as  an  author,  but  for  failure 
of  that  sort,  although  he  was  intensely  am- 
bitious, he  had  no  dread.  There  would  al- 
ways remain  to  him  the  career  of  private 
duty  and  the  life  of  a  gentleman.  This 
view  of  him  gives  the  key  to  his  character 
and  explains  his  conduct.  Neither  amid 
the  experimental  vicissitudes  of  his  youth, 
nor  amid  the  labours,  achievements,  and 
splendid  honours  of  his  manhood,  did  he 
ever  place  the  imagination  above  the  con- 
science, or  brilliant  writing  above  virtuous 
living,  or  art  and  fame  above  morality  and 
religion.  "I  have  been,  perhaps,  the  most 
voluminous  author  of  the  day,"  he  said, 
toward  the  close  of  his  life  ;  "and  it  is  a 
comfort  to  me  to  think  that  I  have  tried 
to  unsettle  no  man's  faith,  to  corrupt  no 
man's  principles,  and  that  I  have  written 
nothing  which,  on  my  deathbed,  I  should 
wish  blotted."     When  at  last  he  lay  upon 


276  SIR   WALTER   SCOTT. 

that  deathbed  the  same  thought  animated 
and  sustained  him.  "  My  dear,"  he  said, 
to  Lockhart,  "  be  a  good  man,  be  virtuous, 
be  religious  —  be  a  good  man.  Nothing  else 
will  give  you  any  comfort  when  you  come 
to  lie  here."  The  mind  which  thus  habit- 
ually dwelt  upon  goodness  as  the  proper 
object  of  human  ambition  and  the  chief 
merit  of  human  life  was  not  likely  to  vaunt 
itself  on  its  labours  or  to  indulge  any 
save  a  modest  and  chastened  pride  in  its 
achievements. 

And  this  view  of  him  explains  the  affec- 
tionate reverence  with  which  the  memory 
of  Sir  Walter  Scott  is  cherished.  He  was 
pre-eminently  a  type  of  the  greatness  that 
is  associated  with  virtue.  But  his  virtue 
was  not  decorum  and  it  was  not  goodyism. 
He  does  not,  with  Addison,  represent  ele- 
gant austerity  ;  and  he  does  not,  with 
Montgomery,  represent  amiable  tameness. 
His  goodness  was  not  insipid.  It  does  not 
humiliate  ;  it  gladdens.  It  is  ardent  with 
heart  and  passion.  It  is  brilliant  with 
imagination.  It  is  fragrant  with  taste  and 
grace.  It  is  alert,  active,  and  triumphant 
with  splendid  mental  achievements  and 
practical  good  deeds.  And  it  is  the  good- 
ness of  a  great  poet  —  the  poet  of  natural 


SIR   WALTER    SCOTT.  27/ 

beauty,  of  romantic  legend,  of  adventure, 
of  chivalry,  of  life  in  its  heyday  of  action 
and  its  golden  glow^  of  pageantry  and  pleas- 
ure. It  found  expression,  and  it  wields 
invincible  and  immortal  power,  through  an 
art  whereof  the  charm  is  the  magic  of  sun- 
rise and  sunset,  the  sombre,  holy  silence  of 
mountains,  the  pensive  solitude  of  dusky 
woods,  the  pathos  of  ancient,  ivy-mantled 
ruins,  and  ocean's  solemn,  everlasting 
chant.  Great  powers  have  arisen  in  Eng- 
lish literature  ;  but  no  romance  has  hushed 
the  voice  of  the  author  of  Waverley,  and  no 
harp  has  drowned  the  music  of  the  Minstrel 
of  the  North. 

The  publication  of  a  new  book  by  Sir 
Walter  Scott  is  a  literary  event  of  great 
importance.  The  time  has  been  when  the 
announcement  of  such  a  novelty  would 
have  roused  the  reading  public  as  with  the 
sound  of  a  trumpet.  That  sensation,  famil- 
iar in  the  early  part  of  the  present  cen- 
tury, is  possible  no  more.  Yet  there  are 
thousands  of  persons  all  over  the  world 
through  whose  hearts  the  thought  of  it 
sends  a  thrill  of  joy.  The  illustrious  author 
of  Marmion  and  of  Waverley  passed  away 
in  1832  :  and  now  (1890),  at  the  distance  of 
fifty-eight  years,  his  private  Journal  is  made 


278  SIR   WALTER    SCOTT. 

a  public  possession.  It  is  the  bestowal  of  a 
great  privilege  and  benefit.  It  is  like  hearing 
the  voice  of  a  deeply-loved  and  long- 
lamented  friend  suddenly  speaking  from 
beyond  the  grave. 

In  literary  history  the  position  of  Scott 
is  unique.  A  few  other  authors,  indeed, 
might  be  named  toward  whom  the  general 
feeling  was  once  exceedingly  cordial,  but  in 
no  other  case  has  the  feeling  entirely  lasted. 
In  the  case  of  Scott  it  endures  in  undimm- 
ished  fervour.  There  are,  of  course,  persons 
to  whom  his  works  are  not  interesting  and 
to  whom  his  personality  is  not  significant. 
Those  persons  are  the  votaries  of  the  photo- 
graph, who  wish  to  see  upon  the  printed 
page  the  same  sights  that  greet  their  vision 
in  the  streets  and  m  the  houses  to  which 
they  are  accustomed.  But  those  prosy  per- 
sons constitute  only  a  single  class  of  the 
public.  People  m  general  are  impressible 
through  the  romantic  instinct  that  is  a  part 
of  human  nature.  To  that  instinct  Scott's 
writings  were  addressed,  and  also  to  the 
heart  that  commonly  goes  with  it.  The 
spirit  that  responds  to  his  genius  is  univer- 
sal and  perennial.  Caprices  of  taste  will 
reveal  themselves  and  will  vanish ;  fash- 
ions will  rise  and  will  fall ;  but  these  muta- 


SIR    WALTER    SCOTT.  279 

tions  toucli  nothing  that  is  elemental  and 
they  will  no  more  displace  Scott  than  they 
will  displace  Shakespeare. 

The  Journal  of  Sir  Walter  Scott  —  valu- 
able for  its  copious  variety  of  thought, 
humour,  anecdote,  and  chronicle  —  is  pre- 
cious, most  of  all,  for  the  confirmatory  light 
that  it  casts  upon  the  character  of  its  writer. 
It  has  long  been  known  that  Scott's  nature 
was  exceptionally  noble,  that  his  patience 
was  beautiful,  that  his  endurance  was 
heroic.  These  pages  disclose  to  his  votaries 
that  he  surpassed  even  the  highest  ideal  of 
him  that  their  affectionate  partiality  has 
formed.  The  period  that  it  covers  was  that 
of  his  adversity  and  decline.  He  began  it 
on  November  20,  1825,  in  his  town  house, 
No.  39  Castle  street,  Edinburgh,  and  he 
continued  it,  with  almost  daily  entries  — 
except  for  various  sadly  significant  breaks, 
after  July  1830  — until  April  16,  1832.  Five 
months  later,  on  September  21,  he  was  dead. 
He  opened  it  with  the  expression  of  a  regret 
that  he  had  not  kept  a  regular  journal  dur- 
ing the  whole  of  his  life.  He  had  just  seen 
some  chapters  of  Byron's  vigorous,  breezy, 
off-hand  memoranda,  and  the  perusal  of 
those  inspiriting  pages  had  revived  in  his 
mind  the  long-cherished,  often-deferred  plan 


28o  SIR    WALTER    SCOTT. 

of  keeping  a  diary.  "  I  have  myself  lost 
recollection,"  lie  says,  "of  much  that  was 
interesting,  and  I  have  deprived  my  family 
and  the  public  of  some  curious  information 
by  not  carrying  this  resolution  into  effect." 
Having  once  begun  the  work  he  steadily 
persevered  in  it,  and  evidently  he  found  a 
comfort  in  its  companionship.  He  wrote 
directly,  and  therefore  fluently,  setting 
down  exactly  what  was  in  his  mind  from 
day  to  day ;  but,  as  he  had  a  well-stored 
and  well-ordered  mind,  he  wrote  with  rea- 
son and  taste,  seldom  about  petty  matters, 
and  never  in  the  strain  of  insipid  babble 
that  egotistical  scribblers  mistake  for  the 
spontaneous  flow  of  nature.  The  facts  that 
he  recorded  were  mostly  material  facts,  and 
the  reflections  that  he  added,  whether  se- 
rious or  humorous,  were  important.  Some- 
times a  bit  of  history  would  glide  into  the 
current  of  the  chronicle  ;  sometimes  a  frag- 
ment of  a  ballad ;  sometimes  an  analytic 
sketch  of  character  —  subtle,  terse,  clear, 
and  obviously  true  ;  sometimes  a  memory 
of  the  past ;  sometimes  a  portraiture  of 
incidents  in  the  present ;  sometimes  a 
glimpse  of  political  life,  a  word  about  paint- 
ing, a  reference  to  music  or  the  stage,  an 
anecdote,  a  tale  of  travel,  a  trait  of  social 


SIR    WALTER    SCOTT.  28 1 

manners,  a  precept  upon  conduct,  or  a 
thought  upon  religion  and  the  destiny  of 
mankind.  There  was  no  pretence  of  order 
and  there  was  no  consciousness  of  an 
audience ;  yet  the  Journal  unconsciously 
assumed  a  symmetrical  form  ;  and  largely 
because  of  the  spontaneous  operation  of  its 
author's  fine  literary  instinct  it  became  a 
composition  worthy  of  the  best  readers.  It 
is  one  of  the  saddest  and  one  of  the  strong- 
est books  ever  written. 

The  original  manuscript  of  this  remark- 
able work  is  contained  in  two  volumes, 
bound  in  vellum,  each  volume  being  fur- 
nished with  a  steel  clasp  that  can  be  fas- 
tened. The  covers  are  slightly  tarnished 
by  time.  The  paper  is  yellow  with  age. 
The  handwriting  is  fine,  cramped,  and  often 
obscure.  "This  hand  of  mine,"  writes 
Scott  (vol.  1.  page  386),  "  gets  to  be  like  a 
kitten's  scratch,  and  will  require  much  de- 
ciphering, or,  what  may  be  as  well  for  the 
writer,  cannot  be  deciphered  at  all,  I  am 
sure  I  cannot  read  it  myself."  The  first 
volume  is  full  of  writing  ;  the  second  about 
half  full.  Toward  the  end  the  record  is 
almost  illegible.  Scott  was  then  at  Rome, 
on  that  melancholy,  mistaken  journey 
whereby  it  had  been  hoped,  but  hoped  in 


282  SIR   WALTER    SCOTT. 

vain,  that  lie  would  recover  his  health.  The 
last  entry  that  he  made  is  this  unfinished 
sentence :   ' '  We  slept  reasonably,  but   on 

the  next  morning ."     It  is  not  known 

that  he  ever  wrote  a  word  after  that  time. 
Lockhart,  who  had  access  to  his  papers, 
made  some  use  of  the  Journal  in  his  Life  of 
ScoU^  which  is  one  of  the  best  biographies 
in  our  language  ;  but  the  greater  part  of  it 
was  withheld  from  publication  till  a  more 
auspicious  time  for  its  perfect  candour  of 
speech.  To  hold  those  volumes  and  to 
look  upon  their  pages  —  so  eloquent  of  the 
great  author's  industry,  so  significant  of  his 
character,  so  expressive  of  his  inmost  soul 
—  was  almost  to  touch  the  hand  of  the 
Minstrel  himself,  to  see  his  smile,  and  to 
hear  his  voice.  Now  that  they  have  ful- 
filled their  purpose,  and  imparted  their  in- 
estimable treasure  to  the  world,  they  are 
restored  to  the  ebony  cabinet  at  Abbotsf  ord, 
there  to  be  treasured  among  the  most 
precious  relics  of  the  past.  "  It  is  the  sad- 
dest house  in  Scotland,"  their  editor,  David 
Douglas,  said  to  me,  when  we  were  walking 
together  upon  the  Braid  Hills,  ' '  for  to  my 
fancy  every  stone  in  it  is  cemented  with 
tears."  Sad  or  glad,  it  is  a  shrine  to  which 
reverent  pilgrims  find  their  way  from  every 


SIR    WALTER    SCOTT.  283 

quarter  of  the  earth,  and  it  will  be  honoured 
and  cherished  forever. 

The  great  fame  of  Scott  had  been  acquired 
by  the  time  he  began  to  write  his  Journal, 
and  it  rested  upon  a  broad  foundation  of 
solid  achievement.  He  was  fifty-four  years 
old,  having  been  born  August  15,  1771,  the 
same  year  in  which  Smollett  died.  He  had 
been  an  author  for  about  thirty  years  —  his 
first  publication,  a  translation  of  Biirger's 
Lenore,  having  appeared  in  1796,  the  same 
year  that  was  darkened  by  the  death  of 
Robert  Burns.  His  social  eminence  also 
had  been  established.  He  had  been  sheriff 
of  Selkirk  for  twenty-five  years.  He  had 
been  for  twenty  years  a  clerk  of  the  Court 
of  Session.  He  had  been  for  five  years  a 
baronet,  having  received  that  rank  from 
King  George  IV.,  who  always  loved  and 
admired  him,  in  1820.  He  had  been  for 
fourteen  years  the  owner  of  Abbotsford, 
which  he  bought  in  1811,  occupied  in  1812, 
and  completed  in  1824.  He  was  yet  to 
write  Woodstock.,  the  six  tales  called  The 
Chronicles  of  the  Canongate,  The  Fair 
Maid  of  Perth,  Anne  of  Geierstein,  Count 
Bohert  of  Paris,  Castle  Dangerotis,  the  Life 
of  Napoleon,  and  the  lovely  Stories  from 
the  History  of  Scotland.    All  those  works, 


284  SIR   WALTER   SCOTT. 

together  with  many  essays  and  reviews, 
were  produced  by  him  between  1825  and 
1832,  while  also  he  was  maintaining  a  con- 
siderable correspondence,  doing  his  official 
duties,  writing  his  Journal^  and  carry- 
ing a  suddenly  imposed  load  of  debt  — 
which  finally  his  herculean  labours  paid  — 
amounting  to  £130,000.  But  between  1805 
and  1817  he  had  written  The  Lay  of  the 
Last  Minstrel,  Ballads  and  Lyrical  Pieces, 
Marmion,  The  Lady  of  the  Lake,  The 
Vision  of  Don  Roderick,  Bokehy,  The  Lord 
of  the  Lsles,  The  Field  of  Waterloo,  and 
Harold  the  Dauntless, — thus  creating  a 
great  and  diversified  body  of  poetry,  then  in 
a  new  school  and  a  new  style,  in  which, 
although  he  has  often  been  imitated,  he 
never  has  been  equalled.  Between  1814 
and  1825  he  had  likewise  produced  Waverley, 
Guy  Mannering,  The  Antiquary,  Old  Mor- 
tality, 'The  Blaick  Dwarf  Boh  Roy,  Tlie 
Heart  of  Midlothian,  A  Legend  of  Mon- 
trose, The  Bride  of  Lammermoor,  Ivanhoe, 
The  Monastery,  TJie  Abbot,  Kenilworth, 
The  Firate,  the  Fortunes  of  Nigel,  Peveril 
of  the  Peak,  Quentin  Durward,  St.  Ronan''s 
Well,  Redgauntlet,  The  Betrothed,  and 
The  Talisman.  This  vast  body  of  fiction 
was  also  a  new  creation  in  literature,  for 


SIR   WALTER    SCOTT.  285 

the  English  novel  prior  to  Scott's  time  was 
the  novel  of  manners,  as  chiefly  represented 
by  the  works  of  Richardson,  Fielding,  and 
Smollett.  That  admirable  author,  Miss  Jane 
Porter,  had,  indeed,  written  the  Scottish 
Chiefs  (1809),  in  which  the  note  of  imagi- 
nation, as  applied  to  the  treatment  of  his- 
torical fact  and  character,  rings  true  and 
clear ;  and  probably  that  beautiful  book 
should  be  remembered  as  the  beginning  of 
English  historical  romance.  Scott  himself 
said  that  it  was  the  parent,  in  his  mind,  of 
the  Waverley  Novels.  But  he  surpassed  it. 
Another  and  perhaps  a  deeper  impulse  to 
the  composition  of  those  novels  was  the 
consciousness,  when  Lord  Byron,  by  the 
publication  of  Childe  Harold  (the  first  and 
second  cantos,  in  1812),  suddenly  checked 
or  eclipsed  his  immediate  popularity  as  a 
poet,  that  it  would  be  necessary  for  him  to 
strike  out  a  new  path.  He  had  begun 
Waverley  in  1805  and  thrown  the  fragment 
aside.  He  took  it  up  again  in  1814,  wrought 
upon  it  for  three  weeks  and  finished  it, 
and  so  began  the  career  of  "  the  Great 
Unknown."  The  history  of  literature  pre- 
sents scarce  a  comparable  example  of  such 
splendid  industry  sustained  upon  such  a 
high  level  of  endeavour,  animated  by  such  a 


286  SIR    WALTER    SCOTT. 

glorious  genius,  and  resultant  in  such  a 
noble  and  beneficent  fruition.  The  life  of 
Balzac,  whom  his  example  inspired,  and 
who  may  be  accounted  the  greatest  of 
French  writers  since  Voltaire,  is  perhaps 
the  only  life  that  drifts  suggestively  into 
the  scholar's  memory  as  he  thinks  of  the 
prodigious  labours  of  Sir  Walter  Scott. 

During  the  days  of  his  prosperity  Scott 
maintained  his  manor  at  Abbotsford  and 
his  town-house  in  Edinburgh,  and  he  fre- 
quently migrated  from  one  to  the  other, 
dispensing  a  liberal  hospitality  at  both.  He 
was  not  one  of  those  authors  who  think  that 
there  is  nothing  in  the  world  but  pen  and 
ink.  He  esteemed  living  to  be  more  impor- 
tant than  writing  about  it,  and  the  develop- 
ment of  the  soul  to  be  a  grander  result  than 
the  production  of  a  book.  ' '  I  hate  an  author 
that's  all  author,"  said  Byron  ;  and  in  this 
virtuous  sentiment  Scott  participated.  His 
character  and  conduct,  his  miaffected  mod- 
esty as  to  his  own  works,  his  desire  to  found 
a  great  house  and  to  maintain  a  stately  rank 
among  the  land-owners  of  his  country,  have, 
for  this  reason,  been  greatly  misunderstood 
by  dull  people.  They  never,  indeed,  would 
have  found  the  least  fault  with  him  if  he  had 
not  become  a  bankrupt ;  for  the  mouth  of 


SIR   WALTER    SCOTT.  287 

every  dunce  is  stopped  by  practical  success. 
When  lie  got  into  debt,  though,  it  was  dis- 
covered that  he  ought  to  have  had  a  higher 
ambition  than  the  wish  to  maintain  a  place 
among  the  landed  gentry  of  Scotland  ;  and 
even  though  he  ultimately  paid  his  debts  — 
literally  working  himself  to  death  to  do  it  — 
he  was  not  forgiven  by  that  class  of  censors  ; 
and  to  some  extent  their  chatter  of  paltry 
disparagement  still  survives.  While  he  was 
rich,  however,  his  halls  were  thronged  with 
fashion,  rank,  and  renown.  Edinburgh,  still 
the  stateliest  city  on  which  the  sun  looks 
down,  must  have  been,  in  the  last  days  of 
George  III. ,  a  place  of  peculiar  beauty,  opu- 
lence, and  social  brilliancy.  Scott,  whose 
father  was  a  Writer  to  the  Signet,  and  who 
derived  his  descent  from  a  good  old  Border 
family  —  the  Scotts  of  Harden — had,  from 
his  youth,  been  accustomed  to  refined  society 
and  elegant  surroundings.  He  was  born  and 
reared  a  gentleman,  and  a  gentleman  he 
never  ceased  to  be.  His  father's  house  was 
in  George  Square  (No.  25),  then  an  aristo- 
cratic quarter,  now  somewhat  fallen  into  the 
sere  and  yellow.  In  that  house,  as  a  boy, 
he  saw  some  of  the  most  distinguished  men 
of  the  age.  In  after  years,  when  his  for- 
tunes were  ripe  and  his  fame  as  a  poet  had 


288  sir'  WALTER    SCOTT. 

been  established,  he  drew  around  himself 
a  kindred  class  of  associates.  The  record 
of  his  life  blazes  with  splendid  names.  As 
a  lad  of  fifteen,  in  1786,  he  saw  Burns,  then 
twenty-seven,  and  in  the  heyday  of  fame  ; 
and  he  also  saw  Dugald  Stewart,  seventeen 
years  his  senior.  Lord  Jeffrey  was  his  con- 
temporary and  friend  —  only  two  years 
younger  than  himself.  With  Henry  Mac- 
kenzie, "the  Addison  of  Scotland"  — born 
in  the  first  year  of  the  last  Jacobite  rebel- 
lion, and  therefore  twenty-six  years  his 
senior  —  he  lived  on  terms  of  cordial  friend- 
ship. David  Hume,  who  died  when  Scott 
was  but  five  years  old,  was  one  of  the  great 
celebrities  of  his  early  days  ;  and  doubtless 
Scott  saw  the  Calton  Hill  when  it  was  as 
Jane  Porter  remembered  it,  "a  vast  green 
slope,  with  no  other  buildings  breaking  the 
line  of  its  smooth  and  magnificent  brow  but 
Hume's  monument  on  one  part  and  the 
astronomical  observatory  on  the  other." 
He  knew  John  Home,  the  author  of  Douglas, 
who  was  his  senior  by  forty-seven  years ; 
and  among  his  miscellaneous  prose  writings 
there  is  an  effective  review  of  Home's  works, 
which  was  written  for  the  Quarterly,  in 
March  1827.  Among  the  actors  his  espe- 
cial friends  were  John  Philip  Kemble,  Mrs. 


SIR   WALTER    SCOTT.  289 

Siddons,  the  elder  Mathews,  John  Ban- 
nister, and  Daniel  Terry.  He  knew  Yates 
also,  and  he  saw  Miss  Foote,  Fanny  Kem- 
ble,  and  the  Mathews  of  our  day  as  "  a 
clever,  rather  forward  lad,"  Goethe  was 
his  correspondent.  Byron  was  his  friend 
and  fervent  admirer.  Wordsworth  and 
Moore  were  among  his  visitors  and  especial 
favourites.  The  aged  Dr.  Adam  Ferguson 
was  one  of  his  intimates.  Hogg,  when  in 
trouble,  always  sought  him,  and  always 
was  helped  and  comforted.  He  was  the 
literary  sponsor  for  Thomas  Campbell. 
He  met  Madame  D'Arblay,  who  was  nine- 
teen years  his  senior,  when  she  was  seventy- 
eight  years  old  ;  and  the  author  of  Evelina 
talked  with  him,  in  the  presence  of  old 
Samuel  Rogers,  then  sixty-three,  about  her 
father,  Dr.  Burney,  and  the  days  of  Dr. 
Johnson.  He  was  honoured  with  the  cordial 
regard  of  the  great  Duke  of  Wellington,  a 
contemporary,  being  only  two  years  his 
senior.  He  knew  Croker,  Haydon,  Chan- 
trey,  Landseer,  Sydney  Smith,  and  Theo- 
dore Honk.  He  read  Vivian  Greif  as  a  new 
publication  and  saw  Disraeli  as  a  beginner. 
Coleridge  he  met  and  marvelled  at.  Mrs. 
Coutts,  who  had  been  Harriet  Mellon,  the 
singer,  and  who  became  the  Duchess  of  St. 

T 


290  SIR   WALTER    SCOTT. 

Albans,  was  a  favourite  with  him.  He  knew 
and  liked  that  savage  critic  William  Gifford. 
His  relations  with  Sir  Humphry  Davy, 
seven  years  his  senior,  were  those  of  kind- 
ness. He  had  a  great  regard  for  Lord 
Castlereagh  and  Lord  Melville.  He  liked 
Robert  Southey,  and  he  cherished  a  deep 
affection  for  the  poet  Crabbe,  who  was 
twenty-three  years  older  than  himself,  and 
who  died  in  the  same  year.  Of  Sir  George 
Beaumont,  the  fond  friend  and  wise  patron 
of  Wordsworth,  who  died  in  February  1827, 
Scott  wrote  that  he  was  ' '  by  far  the  most 
sensible  and  pleasing  man  I  ever  knew." 
Amid  a  society  such  as  is  indicated  by  those 
names  Scott  passed  his  life.  The  brilliant 
days  of  the  Canongate  indeed  were  gone, 
when  all  those  wynds  and  closes  that  fringe 
the  historic  avenue  from  the  Castle  to  Holy- 
rood  were  as  clean  as  wax,  and  when  the 
loveliest  ladies  of  Scotland  dwelt  amongst 
them,  and  were  borne  in  their  chairs  from 
one  house  of  festivity  to  another.  But  New 
street,  once  the  home  of  Lord  Kames,  still 
retained  some  touch  of  its  ancient  finery. 
St.  John  street,  where  once  lived  Lord 
Monboddo  and  his  beautiful  daughter,  Miss 
Burnet  (immortalised  by  Burns) ,  and  where 
(at  No.  10)  Ballantyne  often  convoked  ad- 


SIR   WALTER    SCOTT.  29I 

mirers  of  the  unknown  author  of  Waverley, 
was  still  a  cleanly  j)lace.  Alison  Square, 
George  Square,  Buccleuch  Place,  and  kin- 
dred quarters  were  still  tenanted  by  the 
polished  classes  of  the  stately  old-time  so- 
ciety of  Edinburgh.  The  movement  north- 
ward had  begun  but  as  yet  it  was  inconsider- 
able. In  those  old  drawing-rooms  Scott 
was  an  habitual  visitor,  as  also  he  was  in 
many  of  the  contiguous  county  manors  — 
in  Seton  House,  and  Pinkie  House,  and 
Blackford,  and  Eavelstone,  and  Craigcrook, 
and  Caroline  Park,  and  wherever  else  the 
intellect,  beauty,  rank,  and  fashion  of  the 
Scottish  capital  assembled  ;  and  it  is  certain 
that  after  his  marriage,  in  December  1797, 
with  Miss  Charlotte  Margaret  Carpenter 
the  scenes  of  hospitality  and  of  elegant  fes- 
tival were  numerous  and  gay,  and  were 
peopled  with  all  that  was  brightest  in  the 
ancient  city,  beneath  his  roof-tree  in  Castle 
street  and  his  turrets  of  Abbotsford. 

There  came  a  time,  however,  when  the 
fabric  of  Scott's  fortunes  was  to  be  shat- 
tered and  his  imperial  genius  bowed  into 
the  dust.  He  had  long  been  a  business 
associate  with  Constable,  his  publisher,  and 
also  with  Ballantyne,  his  printer.  The 
publishing   business  failed  and  they  were 


292  SIR    WALTER    SCOTT. 

ruined  together.  It  has  long  been  customary 
to  place  the  blame  for  that  catastrophe  on 
Constable  alone.  Mr.  Douglas,  who  has 
edited  the  Journal  with  characteristic  dis- 
cretion and  taste,  records  his  opinion  that 
"the  three  parties  —  printer,  publisher, 
and  author  —  were  equal  sharers  in  the  im- 
prudences that  led  to  the  disaster ' '  ;  and  he 
directs  attention  to  the  fact  that  the  charge 
that  Constable  ruined  Scott  was  not  made 
during  the  lifetime  of  either.  It  matters 
little  now  in  what  way  the  ruin  was  induced. 
Mismanagement  caused  it,  and  not  misdeed. 
There  was  a  blunder,  but  there  was  no 
fraud.  The  honour  of  all  the  men  con- 
cerned stands  vindicated  before  the  world. 
Moreover,  the  loss  was  retrieved  and  the 
debt  was  paid  —  Scott's  share  of  it  in  full : 
the  other  shares  in  part.  It  is  to  the  period 
of  this  ordeal  that  Scott's  Journal  mainly 
relates.  Great  though  he  had  been  in  pros- 
perity, he  was  to  show  himself  greater  amid 
the  storms  of  disaster  and  affliction.  The 
earlier  pages  of  the  diary  are  cheerful, 
vigorous,  and  confident.  The  mind  of  the 
writer  is  in  no  alarm.  Presently  the  sky 
changes  and  the  tempest  breaks  ;  and  from 
that  time  onward  you  behold  a  spectacle  of 
indomitable  will,  calm  resolution,  inflexible 


SIR    WALTER    SCOTT.  293 

purpose,  patient  endurance,  steadfast  indus- 
try, and  productive  genius  tliat  is  simply 
sublime.  Many  facts  of  living  interest  and 
many  gems  of  subtle  thought  and  happy 
phrase  are  found  in  his  daily  record.  The 
observations  on  immortality  are  in  a  fine 
strain.  The  remarks  on  music,  on  dramatic 
poetry,  on  the  operation  of  the  mental 
faculties,  on  painting,  and  on  national  char- 
acteristics, are  freighted  with  suggestive 
thought.  But  the  noble  presence  of  the 
man  overshadows  even  his  best  words.  He 
lost  his  fortune  in  December  1825.  His 
wife  died  in  May  1826.  On  the  pages  that 
immediately  follow  his  note  of  this  bereave- 
ment Scott  has  written  occasional  words 
that  no  one  can  read  unmoved,  and  that  no 
one  who  has  suffered  can  read  without  a 
pang  that  is  deeper  than  tears. 

But  his  spirit  was  slow  to  break.  "Duty 
to  God  and  to  my  chil  ii en,"  he  said,  "must 
teach  me  patience."  Once  he  speaks  of 
"the  loneliness  of  th?se  watches  of  the 
night."  Not  mitil  his  debts  were  paid  and 
his  duties  fulfilled  \^'ould  that  great  soul 
yield.  ' '  I  may  be  bringing  on  some  serious 
disease,"  he  remarks,  "by  working  thus 
hard  ;  if  I  had  once  justice  done  to  other 
folks,  I  do  not  much  care,  only  I  would  not 


294  ^11^   WALTER    SCOTT. 

like  to  suffer  long  pain. ' '  A  little  later  the 
old  spirit  shows  itself :  "  I  do  not  like  to 
have  it  thought  that  there  is  any  way  in 
which  I  can  be  beaten.  .  .  .  Let  us  use  the 
time  and  faculties  which  God  has  left  us,  and 
trust  futurity  to  His  guidance.  ...  I  want 
to  finish  my  task,  and  then  good-night.  I 
will  never  relax  my  labour  in  these  affairs 
either  for  fear  of  pain  or  love  of  life.  I  will 
die  a  free  man,  if  hard  working  will  do 
it.  .  .  .  My  spirits  are  neither  low  nor  high 
—  grave,  I  think,  and  quiet  —  a  complete 
twilight  of  the  mind.  .  .  .  God  help  —  but 
rather  God  bless  —  man  must  help  himself. 
.  .  .  The  best  is,  the  long  halt  will  arrive 
at  last  and  cure  all.  ...  It  is  my  dogged 
humour  to  yield  little  to  external  circum- 
stances. ...  I  shall  never  see  the  three- 
score and  ten,  and  shall  be  summed  up  at  a 
discount.  No  help  for  it,  and  no  matter 
either."  In  the  mood  of  mingled  submis- 
sion and  resolve  denoted  by  these  sentences 
(which  occur  at  long  intervals  in  the  story), 
he  wi'ought  at  his  task  until  it  was  finished. 
By  Woodstock  he  earned  £8000;  by  the 
Life  of  Napoleon  £18,000  ;  by  other  writ- 
ings still  other  sums.  The  details  of  his  toil 
appear  day  by  day  in  these  simple  pages, 
tragic  through  all  their  simplicity.     He  was 


SIR    WALTER    SCOTT.  295 

a  heart-broken  man  from  the  hour  when  his 
wife  died,  but  he  sustained  himself  by  force 
of  will  and  sense  of  honour,  and  he  en- 
dured and  worked  till  the  end  without  a 
murmur ;  and  when  he  had  done  his  task 
he  laid  down  his  pen  and  died. 

The  lesson  of  Scott's  Journal  is  the  most 
important  lesson  that  experience  can  teach. 
It  is  taught  in  two  words  —  honour  and 
duty.  Nothing  is  more  obvious,  from  the 
nature  and  environment  and  the  conse- 
quent condition  of  the  human  race,  than 
the  fact  that  this  world  is  not,  and  was  not 
intended  to  be,  a  place  of  settled  happiness. 
All  human  beings  have  troubles,  and  as  the 
years  pass  away  those  troubles  become 
more  numerous,  more  heavy,  and  more  hard 
to  bear.  The  ordeal  through  which  human- 
ity is  passing  is  an  ordeal  of  discipline  for 
spiritual  development.  To  live  in  honour, 
to  labour  with  steadfast  industry,  and  to 
endure  with  cheerful  patience  is  to  be  vic- 
torious. Whatever  in  literature  will  illus- 
trate this  doctrine,  and  whatever  in  human 
example  will  commend  and  enforce  it,  is  of 
transcendent  value  ;  and  that  value  is  inher- 
ent in  the  example  of  Sir  Walter  Scott. 


296  ELEGIAC    MEMORIALS. 


XXI. 

ELEGIAC     MEMORIALS. 

ONE  denotement  —  among  many  —  of  a 
genial  change,  a  relaxation  of  the  old 
ecclesiastical  austerity  long  prevalent  in 
Scotland,  is  perceptible  in  the  lighter  char- 
acter of  her  modern  sepulchral  monuments. 
In  the  old  churchyard  of  St,  Michael,  at 
Dumfries,  the  burial-place  of  Burns,  there 
is  a  hideous,  dismal  mass  of  misshapen, 
weather-beaten  masonry,  the  mere  aspect 
of  which  —  before  any  of  its  gruesome  in- 
scriptions are  read  —  is  a  rebuke  to  hope 
and  an  alarm  to  despair.  Thus  the  relig- 
ionists of  old  tried  to  make  death  terrible. 
Much  of  this  same  order  of  abhorrent  archi- 
tecture—  the  ponderous  exponent  of  im- 
mitigable woe  —  may  be  found  in  the  old 
Greyfriars  churchyard  in  Edinburgh,  and 
in  that  of  the  Canongate.  But  the  pilgrim 
to  the  Dean  cemetery  and  the  Warriston  — 
both  comparatively  modern,  and  beautifully 
situated  at  different  points  on  the  north 


ELEGIAC    MEMORIALS.  297 

side  of  the  Water  of  Leith  —  finds  them 
adorned  with  every  grace  that  can  hallow 
the  repose  of  the  dead,  or  soothe  the  grief, 
or  mitigate  the  fear,  or  soften  the  bitter 
resentment  of  the  living.  Hope,  and  not 
despair,  is  the  spirit  of  the  new  epoch  in 
religion,  and  it  is  hope  not  merely  for  a 
sect  but  for  all  mankind. 

The  mere  physical  loveliness  of  those 
cemeteries  may  well  tempt  you  to  explore 
them ;  but  no  one  will  neglect  them  who 
cares  for  the  storied  associations  of  the 
past.  Walking  in  the  Dean,  on  an  after- 
noon half-cloudy  and  half-bright,  when  the 
large  trees  that  guard  its  western  limit  and 
all  the  masses  of  foliage  in  the  dark  ravine 
of  the  Leith  were  softly  rustling  in  the 
balmy  summer  wind,  while  overhead  and 
far  aromid  the  solemn  cawing  of  the  rooks 
mmgled  sleepily  with  the  twitter  of  the 
sparrows,  I  thought,  as  I  paced  the  sunlit 
aisles,  that  Nature  could  nowhere  show  a 
scene  of  sweeter  peace.  In  this  gentle  sol- 
itude has  been  laid  to  its  everlasting  rest 
all  that  could  die  of  some  of  the  greatest 
leaders  of  thought  in  modern  Scotland.  It 
was  no  common  experience  to  muse  beside 
the  tomb  of  Francis  Jeffrey  —  the  formida- 
ble Lord  Jeffrey  of  The  Edinhuryh  Beview. 


290  ELEGIAC    MEMORIALS. 

He  lies  buried  near  tlie  great  wall  on  the 
western  side  of  the  Dean  cemetery,  with 
his  wife  beside  him.  A  flat,  oblong  stone 
tomb,  imposed  upon  a  large  stone  platform 
and  overshadowed  with  tall  trees,  marks 
the  place,  on  one  side  of  which  is  written 
that  once-famous  and  dreaded  name,  now 
spoken  with  indifference  or  not  spoken  at 
all :  "  Francis  Jeffrey.  Born  Oct.  23,  1773. 
Died  Jan.  25,  1850."  On  the  end  of  the 
tomb  is  a  medallion  portrait  of  Jeffrey,  in 
bronze.  It  is  a  profile,  and  it  shows  a  sym- 
metrical head,  a  handsome  face  —  severe, 
refined,  frigid  —  and  altogether  it  is  the  de- 
notement of  a  personality  remarkable  for 
the  faculty  of  taste  and  the  instinct  of 
decorum,  though  not  for  creative  power. 
Close  by  Lord  Jeffrey,  a  little  to  the  south, 
are  buried  Sir  Archibald  Alison,  the  his- 
torian of  Europe,  and  Henry  Cockburn,  the 
great  jurist.  Combe,  the  philosopher,  rests 
near  the  south  front  of  the  wall  that  bisects 
this  cemetery  from  east  to  west.  Not  far 
from  the  memorials  of  these  famous  persons 
is  a  shaft  of  honour  to  Lieutenant  John 
Irving,  who  was  one  of  the  companions  of 
Sir  John  Franklin,  and  who  perished  amid 
the  Polar  ice  in  King  William's  Land  in 
1848-49. 


ELEGIAC    MEMORIALS.  299 

In  another  part  of  the  ground  a  tall  cross 
commemorates  David  Scott,  the  painter 
(1807-18i9),  presenting  a  superb  effigy  of 
his  head,  in  one  of  the  most  animated  pieces 
of  bronze  that  have  copied  human  life. 
Against  the  eastern  wall,  on  the  terrace 
overlooking  the  ravine  and  the  rapid  Water 
of  Leith,  stands  the  tombstone  of  John 
Blackwood,  "  Editor  of  Blackwood'' s  Maga- 
zine for  thirty-three  years  :  Died  at  Strath- 
tyrum,  29th  Oct.  1879.  Age  60."  This 
inscription,  cut  upon  a  broad  white  marble, 
with  scroll-work  at  the  base,  and  set  against 
the  wall,  is  surmounted  with  a  coat  of  arms, 
in  gray  stone,  bearing  the  motto,  "  Per  vias 
rectas."  Many  other  eminent  names  may 
be  read  in  this  garden  of  death  ;  but  most 
interesting  of  all,  and  those  that  most  of 
all  I  sought,  are  the  names  of  Wilson  and 
Aytoun.  Those  worthies  were  buried  close 
together,  almost  in  the  centre  of  the  ceme- 
tery. The  grave  of  the  great  ' '  Christopher 
North  "  is  marked  by  a  simple  monolith  of 
Aberdeen  granite,  beneath  a  tree,  and  it 
bears  only  this  inscription  ;  ' '  John  Wilson, 
Professor  of  Moral  Philosophy,  Born  18th 
of  May,  1785.  Died  3d  April,  1854."  Far 
more  elaborate  is  the  white  marble  monu- 
ment —  a  square  tomb,  with  carvings  of  re- 


300  ELEGIAC    MEMORIALS. 

cessed  Gothic  windows  on  its  sides,  support- 
ing a  tall  cross  —  erected  to  the  memory  of 
Aytoun  and  of  his  wife,  who  was  Wilson's 
daughter.  The  inscriptions  tell  their  suffi- 
cient story  :  "  Jane  Emily  Wilson,  beloved 
wife  of  William  Edmondstoune  Aytoun. 
Obiit  15  April,  1859."  "  Here  is  laid  to  rest 
William  Edmondstoune  Aytoun,  D.C.L., 
Oxon.,  Professor  of  Ehetoric  and  English 
Literature  in  the  University  of  Edinburgh. 
Sheriff  of  Orkney  and  Zetland.  Born  at 
Edinburgh,  21st  June,  1813.  Died  at  Black- 
hills,  Elgin,  4tli  August,  1865.  '  Waiting 
for  the  coming  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ.' 
1  Cor.  i.  7."  So  they  sleep,  the  poets, 
wits,  and  scholars  that  were  once  so  bright 
in  genius,  so  gay  in  spirit,  so  splendid  in 
achievement,  so  vigorous  in  affluent  and 
brilliant  life  !  It  is  the  old  story,  and  it 
teaches  the  old  moral. 

Warriston,  not  more  beautiful  than  Dean, 
is  perhaps  more  beautiful  in  situation  ;  cer- 
tainly it  commands  a  more  beautiful  pros- 
pect. You  will  visit  Warriston  for  the 
sake  of  Alexander  Smith  ;  for  you  have  not 
forgotten  the  Life  Drama,  the  City  Poems, 
Edwin  of  Deira,  Alfred  HagarVs  House- 
hold, and  A  Summer  in  Skye.  He  lies  in  the 
northeast  corner  of  the  ground,  at  the  foot 


ELEGIAC    MEMORIALS.  30I 

of  a  large  lona  cross  which  is  bowered  by  a 
chestnut-tree.  Above  him  the  green  sod  is 
like  a  carpet  of  satin.  The  cross  is  thickly- 
carved  with  laurel,  thistle,  and  holly,  and  it 
bears  upon  its  front  the  face  of  the  poet,  in 
bronze,  and  the  harp  that  betokens  his  art. 
It  is  a  bearded  face,  having  small,  refined 
features,  a  slightly  pouted,  sensitive  mouth, 
and  being  indicative  more  of  nervous  sensi- 
bility than  of  rugged  strength.  The  inscrip- 
tion gives  simply  his  name  and  dates : 
"Alexander  Smith,  Poet  and  Essayist. 
Born  at  Kilmarnock,  31st  December,  1829. 
Died  at  Wardie,  5th  January,  1867 .  Erected 
by  some  of  his  personal  Friends."  Standing 
by  his  grave,  at  the  foot  of  this  cross,  you 
can  gaze  straight  away  southward  to  Ar- 
thur's Seat,  and  behold  the  whole  line  of 
imperial  Edinburgh  at  a  glance,  from  the 
Calton  Hill  to  the  Castle.  It  is  such  a  spot 
as  he  would  have  chosen  for  his  sepulchre  — 
face  to  face  with  the  city  that  he  so  dearly 
loved.  Near  him  on  the  east  wall  appears 
a  large  slab  of  Aberdeen  granite,  to  mark 
the  grave  of  still  another  Scottish  worthy, 
"James  Ballantine,  Poet.  Born  11th  June, 
1808.  Died  18th  Dec,  1877."  And  mid- 
way along  the  slope  of  the  northern  terrace, 
a  little  eastward  of  the  chapel,  under  a  free- 


302  ELEGIAC    MEMORIALS. 

stone  monolith  bearing  the  butterfly  that 
is  Nature's  symbol  of  immortality,  you 
will  see  the  grave  of  "  Sir  James  Young 
Simpson,  Bart.,  M.D.,  D.C.L.  Born  1811. 
Died  1870."  And  if  you  are  weary  of 
thinking  about  the  evanescence  of  the 
poets  you  can  reflect  that  there  was  no 
exemption  from  the  common  lot  even  for 
one  of  the  greatest  physical  benefactors  of 
the  human  race. 

The  oldest  and  the  most  venerable  and 
mysterious  of  the  cemeteries  of  Edinburgh 
is  that  of  the  Grey  friars.  Irregular  in  shape 
and  uneven  in  surface,  it  encircles  its 
famous  old  church,  in  the  haunted  neigh- 
bourhood of  the  West  Bow,  and  is  itself 
hemmed  in  with  many  buildings.  More 
than  four  centuries  ago  this  was  the  garden 
of  the  Monastery  of  the  Greyfriars,  founded 
by  James  I.  of  Scotland,  and  thus  it  gets 
its  name.  The  monastery  disappeared  long 
ago :  the  garden  was  turned  into  a  grave- 
yard in  the  time  of  Queen  Mary  Stuart, 
and  by  her  order.  The  building,  called  the 
Old  Church,  dates  back  to  1G12,  but  it  was 
burnt  in  1845  and  subsequently  restored. 
Here  the  National  Covenant  was  subscribed 
(1638)  by  the  lords  and  by  the  people,  and 
■  in  this  doubly  consecrated  ground  are  laid 


ELEGIAC    MEMORIALS.  303 

the  remains  of  many  of  those  heroic  Cove- 
nanters who  subsequently  suffered  death 
for  conscience  and  their  creed.  There  is 
a  large  book  of  The  Epitaphs  and  Monu- 
mental Inscriptions  in  Greyfriars  Church- 
yard made  by  James  Brown,  keei^er  of 
the  grounds,  and  published  in  1867.  That 
record  does  not  pretend  to  be  complete, 
and  yet  it  mentions  no  less  than  two 
thousand  two  hundred  and  seventy-one 
persons  who  are  sepulchred  in  this  place. 
Among  those  sleepers  are  Duncan  Forbes 
of  Culloden  ;  Robert  Mylne,  who  built 
a  part  of  Holyrood  Palace  ;  Sir  George 
Mackenzie,  the  persecutor  of  the  Covenan- 
ters ;  Carstares,  the  adviser  of  King  AVil- 
liam  III. ;  Sir  Adam  Ferg-uson ;  Henry 
Mackenzie  ;  Robertson  and  Ty tier,  the  histo- 
rians ;  Sir  Walter  Scott's  father ;  and  several 
of  the  relatives  of  Mrs.  Siddons.  Captain 
John  Porteous,  who  was  hanged  in  the 
Grass-market  by  riotous  citizens  of  Edin- 
burgh, on  the  night  of  September  7,  1736, 
and  whose  story  is  so  vividly  told  in  TJie 
Heart  of  Midlothian,  was  buried  in  the 
Greyfriars  Churchyard,  "three  dble.  pace 
from  the  S.  corner  Chalmers'  tomb  "  (1730). 
James  Brown's  record  of  the  churchyard 
contains  various  particulars,  quoted  from 


304  ELEGIAC    MEMORIALS. 

the  old  church  register.  Of  William  Rob- 
ertson, minister  of  the  parish,  who  died  in 
1745,  we  read  that  he  "lies  near  the  tree 
next  Blackwood's  ground."  "Mr.  Allan 
Ramsay,"  says  the  same  quaint  chronicle, 
"lies  6  dble.  paces  southwest  the  blew 
stone  :  A  poet :  old  age  :  Buried  9th  Janu- 
ary 1758."  Christian  Ross,  his  wife,  who 
preceded  the  aged  bard  by  fifteen  years,  lies 
in  the  same  grave.  Sir  Walter  Scott's 
father  was  laid  there  on  April  18, 1799,  and 
his  daughter  Anne  was  placed  beside  him 
in  1801.  In  a  letter  addressed  to  his 
brother  Thomas,  in  1819,  Sir  Walter  wrote  : 
"  When  poor  Jack  was  buried  in  the  Grey- 
friars  churchyard,  where  my  father  and 
Anne  lie,  I  thought  their  graves  more  en- 
croached upon  than  I  liked  to  witness." 
The  remains  of  the  Regent  Morton  were,  it 
is  said,  wrapped  in  a  cloak  and  secretly 
buried  there  at  night —  June  2,  1581  — low 
down  toward  the  northern  wall.  The  sup- 
posed grave  of  the  superb  Latin  poet  George 
Buchanan  ("the  elegant  Buchanan,"  Dr. 
Johnson  calls  him)  is  not  distant  from  this 
spot ;  and  in  the  old  church  may  be  seen  a 
beautiful  window,  a  triple  lancet,  in  the 
south  aisle,  placed  there  to  commemorate 
that  illustrious  author. 


ELEGIAC   MEMORIALS.  305 

Hugh  Miller  and  Dr.  Chalmers  were  laid 
in  the  Grange  cemetery,  which  is  in  the 
southern  part  of  the  city,  near  Morningside. 
Adam  Smith  is  commemorated  by  a  heavy 
piece  of  masonry,  over  his  dust,  at  the  south 
end  of  the  Canongate  churcliyard,  and 
Dugald  Stewart  by  a  ponderous  tomb  at  the 
north  end  of  it,  where  he  was  buried,  as 
also  by  the  monument  on  the  Calton  Hill. 
It  is  to  see  Ferguson's  gravestone,  however, 
that  the  pilgrim  explores  the  Canongate 
churchyard  —  and  a  dreary  place  it  is  for 
the  last  rest  of  a  poet.  Robert  Burns 
placed  the  stone,  and  on  the  back  of  it  is 
inscribed:  "By  special  grant  of  the  mana- 
gers to  Robert  Burns,  who  erected  this 
stone,  this  burial-place  is  to  remain  for  ever 
sacred  to  Robert  Ferguson."  That  poet 
was  born  September  6,  1751,  and  died 
October  16,  1774.  These  lines,  written  by 
Burns,  with  an  intentional  reminiscence  of 
Gray,  whose  Elegy  he  fervently  admired, 
are  his  epitaph  — 

"  No  sculptured  marl)le  here,  nor  pompous  lay, 
No  storied  urn  nor  animated  bust  — 
This  simple  stone  directs  pale  Scotia's  way 
To  pour  her  sorrows  o'er  her  Poet's  dust." 

One  of  the  greatest  minds  of  Scotland, 
and  indeed  of  the  world,  was  David  Hume, 
u 


306  ELEGIAC    MEMORIALS. 

who  could  think  more  clearly  and  express 
his  thoughts  more  precisely  and  cogently 
upon  great  subjects  than  almost  any  meta- 
physician of  our  English-speaking  race.  His 
tomb  is  in  the  old  Calton  cemetery,  close 
by  the  prison,  a  grim  Roman  tower,  pre- 
dominant over  the  Waverley  Vale  and  visible 
from  every  part  of  it.  This  structure  is 
open  to  the  sky,  and  within  it  and  close 
around  its  interior  edge  nine  melancholy 
bushes  are  making  a  forlorn  effort' to  grow 
in  the  stony  soil  that  covers  the  great  his- 
torian's dust.  There  is  an  urn  above  the 
door  of  this  mausoleum  and  surmounting 
the  urn  is  this  inscription  :  ' '  David  Hume. 
Born  April  26th,  1711.  Died  August  25th, 
1776.  Erected  in  memory  of  him  in  1778." 
In  another  part  of  this  ground  you  may  find 
the  sepulchre  of  Sir  Walter  Scott's  friend 
and  publisher,  Archibald  Constable,  born 
24th  February  1774,  died  21st  July  1827. 
Several  priests  were  roaming  over  the  ceme- 
tery when  I  saw  it,  making  its  dismal  aspect 
still  more  dismal  by  that  rook-like,  unctuous, 
furtive  aspect  which  often  marks  the  eccle- 
siastic of  the  Roman  Catholic  church. 

Another  great  man,  Thomas  de  Quincey, 
is  buried  in  the  old  churchyard  of  the  West 
church,  that  lies  in  the  valley  just  beneath 


ELEGIAC    MEMORIAL*.  307 

the  west  front  of  the  crag  of  Edinhurgh 
Castle.  I  went  to  that  spot  on  a  bright 
and  lovely  autumn  evening.  The  place 
was  deserted,  except  for  the  presence  of  a 
gardener,  to  whom  I  made  my  request  that 
he  would  guide  me  to  the  grave  of  De  Quin- 
cej^  It  is  an  inconspicuous  place,  marked 
by  a  simple  slab  of  dark  stone,  set  against 
the  wall,  in  an  angle  of  the  enclosure,  on  a 
slight  acclivity.  As  you  look  upward  from 
this  spot  you  see  the  grim,  magnificent  cas- 
tle frovming  on  its  precipitous  height.  The 
grave  was  covered  thick  with  grass,  and  in 
a  narrow  trench  of  earth  cut  in  the  sod 
around  it  many  pansies  and  marigolds  were 
in  bloom.  Upon  the  gravestone  is  written : 
"Sacred  to  the  memory  of  Thomas  de 
Quincey,  who  was  born  at  Greenhay,  near 
Manchester,  August  15th,  1785,  and  died 
in  Edinburgh,  December  8th,  1859.  And 
of  Margaret,  his  wife,  who  died  August  7, 
1837."  Just  over  the  honoured  head  of  the 
illustrious  sleeper  were  two  white  daisies 
peeping  through  the  green  ;  one  of  which  I 
thought  it  not  a  sin  to  take  away  —  for  it  is 
the  symbol  at  once  of  peace  and  hope,  and 
therefore  a  sufficient  embodiment  of  the 
best  that  death  can  teach. 


308  SCOTTISH   PICTURES. 


XXII. 

SCOTTISH    PICTURES. 

STRONACHLACHEK,  Loch  Katrine, 
September  1,  1890.  —  No  one  needs  to 
be  told  that  the  Forth  bridge  is  a  wonder. 
All  the  world  knows  it,  and  knows  that  the 
art  of  the  engineer  has  here  achieved  its 
masterpiece.  The  bridge  is  not  beautiful, 
whether  viewed  from  afar  or  close  at  hand. 
You  see  it  —  or  some  part  of  it  —  from  every 
height  to  which  you  mount  in  Edinburgh. 
It  is  visible  from  the  Calton  Hill,  from  the 
Nelson  column,  from  the  Scott  monument,, 
from  the  ramparts  of  the  Castle,  from  Salis- 
bury Crags,  from  the  Braid  Hills,  and  of 
course  from  the  eminence  of  Arthur's  Seat. 
Other  objects  of  interest  there  are  which 
seek  the  blissful  shade,  but  the  Forth  bridge 
is  an  object  of  interest  that  insists  upon 
being  seen.  The  visitor  to  the  shores  of 
the  Forth  need  not  mount  any  height  in 
order  to  perceive  it,  for  all  along  those 
shores,  from  Dirleton  to  Leith  and  from  Elie 


I- 


SCOTTISH    PICTURES.  309 

to  Burntisland,  it  frequently  comes  into 
the  picture.  While,  however,  it  is  not 
beautiful,  it  impresses  the  observer  with  a 
sense  of  colossal  magnificence.  It  is  a  more 
triumphant  structure  even  than  the  Eiffel 
tower,  and  it  predominates  over  the  vision 
and  the  imagination  by  the  same  audacity  of 
purpose  and  the  same  consummate  fulfilment 
which  mark  that  other  marvel  and  establish 
it  in  universal  admiration.  Crossing  the 
bridge  early  this  morning  I  deeply  felt  its 
superb  potentiality,  and  was  charmed  like- 
wise with  its  pictorial  effect.  That  effect  is 
no  doubt  due  in  part  to  its  accessories.  Both 
ways  the  broad  expanse  of  the  Forth  was 
visible  for  many  miles.  It  was  a  still  morn- 
ing, overcast  and  mournful.  There  was  a 
light  breeze  from  the  southeast,  —  the  air 
at  that  elevation  being  as  sweet  as  new  milk. 
Beneath,  far  down,  the  surface  of  the  steel- 
gray  water  was  wrinkled  like  the  scaly  back 
of  a  fish.  Midway  a  little  island  rears  its 
spine  of  rock  out  of  the  stream.  Westward 
at  some  distance  rises  a  crag,  on  which  is 
a  tiny  lighthouse-tower,  painted  red.  The 
long,  graceful  stone  piers  that  stretch  into 
the  Forth  at  this  point,  —  which  are  break- 
waters to  form  a  harbour,  —  and  all  the  little 
gray  houses  of  Queensferry,  Inverkeithing, 


3IO  SCOTTISH    PICTURES. 

and  the  adjacent  villages  looked  like  the  toy 
buildings  which  are  the  playthings  of  chil- 
dren. A  steamboat  was  making  her  way 
up  the  river,  while  near  the  shores  were 
many  small  boats  swinging  at  their  moor- 
ings, for  the  business  of  the  day  v^as  not  yet 
begun.  Over  this  scene  the  scarce-risen  sun, 
much  obscured  by  dull  clouds,  cast  a  faint 
rosy  light  —  and  even  while  the  picture  was 
at  its  best  we  glided  away  from  it  into  the 
pleasant  land  of  Fife. 

In  former  days  the  traveller  to  Stirling 
commonly  went  by  the  w^ay  of  Linlithgow, 
•which  is  the  place  where  Mary  Stuart  was 
born,  and  he  was  all  the  more  prompted  to 
think  of  that  enchanting  woman  because  he 
usually  caught  a  glimpse  of  the  ruins  of  Nid- 
dry  Castle  —  one  of  the  houses  of  her  faith- 
ful Lord  Seton  —  at  which  she  rested,  on  the 
romantic  and  memorable  occasion  of  her 
flight  from  Loch  Leven.  Now,  since  the 
Forth  bridge  has  been  opened,  the  most  direct 
route  to  Stirling  is  by  Dunfermline.  And 
this  is  a  gain,  for  Dunfermline  is  one  of  the 
most  interesting  places  in  Scotland.  That 
Malcolm  of  whom  we  catch  a  glimpse  when 
we  see  a  representation  of  Shakespeare's 
tragedy  of  Macbeth  had  a  royal  castle  there 
nine  hundred  years  ago,  of  which  a  frag- 


SCOTTISH   PICTURES.  3 II 

raent  still  remains  ;  and  on  a  slope  of  the 
Coast,  a  few  miles  west  from  Dunfermline, 
the  vigilant  antiquarian  has  fixed  the  site  of 
Macduff's  castle,  where  Lady  Macduff  and 
her  children  were  slaughtered  by  the  tyrant. 
In  the  ancient  church  at  Dunfermline,  the 
church  of  the  Holy  Trinity,  —  devastated  at 
the  Reformation,  but  since  restored,  —  you 
may  see  the  great  blue-gray  stone  which 
covers  the  tomb  of  Malcolm  and  of  Margaret, 
his  queen  —  an  angel  among  women  when 
she  lived,  and  worthy  to  be  remembered 
now  as  the  saint  that  her  church  has  made 
her.  The  body  of  Margaret,  who  died  at 
Edinburgh  Castle,  November  16,  1093,  was 
secretly  and  hastily  conveyed  to  Dunferm- 
line, and  there  buried,  —  Edinburgh  Castle 
(The  Maiden  Castle  it  was  then  called) 
being  assailed  by  her  husband's  brother, 
Donald  Bane.  The  remains  of  that  noble 
and  devoted  woman,  however,  do  not  rest 
in  that  tomb,  for  long  afterward,  at  the 
Reformation,  they  were  taken  away,  and 
after  various  wanderings  were  enshrined 
at  the  church  of  St.  Lawrence  in  the  Escu- 
rial.  I  had  often  stood  in  the  little  chapel 
that  this  good  queen  founded  in  Edinburgh 
Castle,  —  a  place  which  they  desecrate  now, 
by  using  it  as  a  shop  for  the  sale  of  pictures 


312  SCOTTISH    PICTUKES. 

and  memorial  trinkets,  —  and  I  was  soon 
to  stand  in  the  ruins  of  Saint  Oran's  chapel 
in  far  lona,  which  also  was  built  by  her ; 
and  so  it  was  with  many  reverent  thoughts 
of  an  exalted  soul  and  a  beneficent  life  that 
I  saw  the  great  dark  tower  of  Dunfermline 
church  vanish  in  the  distance.  At  Stirling 
the  rain,  which  had  long  been  lowering, 
came  down  in  floods,  and  after  that  for 
many  hours  there  was  genuine  Scotch 
weather  and  a  copious  abundance  of  it. 
This  also  is  an  experience,  and,  although 
that  superb  drive  over  the  mountain  from 
Aberfoyle  to  Loch  Katrine  was  marred  by 
the  wet,  I  was  well  pleased  to  see  the 
Trosach  country  in  storm,  which  I  had 
before  seen  in  sunshine.  It  is  a  land  of  in- 
finite variety,  and  lovely  even  in  tempest. 
The  majesty  of  the  rocky  heights  ;  the  bleak 
and  barren  loneliness  of  the  treeless  hills ; 
the  many  thread-like  waterfalls  which,  seen 
afar  off,  are  like  ri\Tilets  of  silver  frozen 
into  stillness  on  the  mountain-sides  ;  the 
occasional  apparition  of  precipitous  peaks, 
over  which  presently  are  driven  the  white 
streamers  of  the  mist — all  these  are  strik- 
ing elements  of  a  scene  which  blends  into 
the  perfection  of  grace  the  qualities  of 
gentle    beauty    and  wild   romance.      Ben 


SCOTTISH    PICTURES.  313 

Lomond  in  the  west  and  Ben  Venue  and 
Ben  Ledi  in  the  north  were  indistinct,  and 
so  was  Ben  A' an  in  its  nearer  cloud  ;  but  a 
brisk  wind  had  swept  tlie  mists  from  Loch 
Drunkie,  and  under  a  bleak  sky  the  smooth 
surface  of  "lovely  Loch  Achray "  shone 
like  a  liquid  diamond.  An  occasional  grouse 
rose  from  the  ferns  and  quickly  winged  its 
way  to  cover.  A  few  cows,  wet  but  indif- 
ferent, composed,  and  contented,  were  now 
and  then  visible,  grazing  in  that  desert; 
while  high  upon  the  crags  appeared  many 
sure-footed  sheep,  the  inevitable  inhabitants 
of  those  solitudes.  So  onward,  breathing 
the  sweet  air  that  here  was  perfumed  by 
miles  and  miles  of  purple  heather,  I  de- 
scended through  the  dense  coppice  of  birch 
and  pine  that  fringes  Loch  Katrine,  and  all 
in  a  moment  came  out  upon  the  levels  of  the 
lake.  It  was  a  long  sail  down  Loch  Katrine 
for  a  pilgrim  drenched  and  chilled  by  the 
steady  fall  of  a  penetrating  rain  ;  but  Ellen's 
Isle  and  Fitz-James's  silver  strand  brought 
pleasant  memories  of  one  of  the  sweetest 
of  stories,  and  all  the  lonesome  waters 
seemed  haunted  with  a  ghostly  pageant  of 
the  radiant  standards  of  Roderick  Dhu. 
To-night  the  mists  are  on  the  mountains, 
and  upon  this  little  pine-clad  promontory  ot 


314  SCOTTISH    PICTURES. 

Stronachlacher  the  darkness  comes  down 
early  and  seems  to  close  it  in  from  all  the 
world.  The  waters  of  Loch  Katrine  are 
black  and  gloomy  and  no  sound  is  heard 
but  the  rush  of  the  rain  and  the  sigh  of  the 
pines.  It  is  a  night  for  memory  and  for 
thought,  and  to  them  let  it  be  devoted. 

The  night- wind  that  sobs  in  the  trees  — 
Ah,  would  that  my  spirit  could  tell 
What  an  infinite  meaning  it  breathes, 
What  a  sorrow  and  longing  it  wakes  I 


< 

n 


IMPERIAL    RUINS.  315 


XXIII. 

IMPERIAL    RUINS. 

OBAN,  September  4, 1890.  —  Going  west- 
ward from  Stronachlacher  a  drive  of 
several  delicious  miles,  through  the  country 
of  Rob  Roy,  ends  at  Inversnaid  and  the 
shore  of  Loch  Lomond.  The  rain  had 
passed,  but  under  a  dusky,  lowering  sky 
the  dense  white  mists,  driven  by  a  fresh 
morning  wind,  were  drifting  along  the  heath- 
clad  hills,  like  a  pageant  of  angels  trailing 
robes  of  light.  Loch  Arklet  and  the  little 
shieling  where  was  born  Helen,  the  wife  of 
the  Macgregor,  were  soon  past  —  a  peaceful 
region  smiling  in  the  vale ;  and  presently, 
along  the  northern  bank  of  the  Arklet, 
whose  copious,  dark,  and  rapid  waters, 
broken  into  foam  upon  their  rocky  bed, 
make  music  all  the  way,  I  descended  that 
precipitous  road  to  Loch  Lomond  which, 
through  many  a  devious  turning  and  sudden 
peril  in  the  fragrant  coppice,  reaches  safety 
at  last  in  one  of  the  wildest  of  Highland 


3l6  IMPERIAL    RUINS. 

glens.  This  drive  is  a  chief  delight  of  High- 
land travel,  and  it  appears  to  be  one  that 
"the  march  of  improvement"  —  meaning 
the  extension  of  railways  —  can  never  abol- 
ish ;  for,  besides  being  solitary  and  beauti- 
ful, the  way  is  difficult.  You  easily  divine 
what  a  sanctuary  that  region  must  have 
been  to  the  bandit  chieftain,  when  no  road 
traversed  it  save  perhaps  a  sheep-track  or  a 
path  for  horses,  and  when  it  was  darkly  cov- 
ered with  the  thick  pines  of  the  Caledonian 
forest.  Scarce  a  living  creature  was  any- 
where visible.  A  few  hardy  sheep,  indeed, 
were  grazing  on  the  mountain  slopes  ;  a  few 
cattle  were  here  and  there  couched  among 
the  tall  ferns  ;  and  sometimes  a  sable  com- 
pany of  rooks  flitted  by,  cawing  drearily 
overhead.  Once  I  saw  the  slow-stepping, 
black-faced,  puissant  Highland  bull,  with 
his  menacing  head  and  his  dark  air  of  sus- 
pended hostility  and  inevitable  predomi- 
nance. All  the  cataracts  in  those  mountain 
glens  were  at  the  flood  because  of  the  con- 
tinuous heavy  rains  of  an  uncommonly 
wet  season,  and  at  Inversnaid  the  magnifi- 
cent waterfall  —  twin  sister  to  Lodore  and 
Aira  Force  —  came  down  in  great  floods  of 
black  and  silver,  and  with  a  long  resounding 
roar  that  seemed  to  shake  the  forest.     Soon 


IMPERIAL    RUINS.  317 

the  welcome  sun  began  to  pierce  the  mists ; 
patches  of  soft  blue  sky  became  visible 
through  rifts  in  the  gray  ;  and  a  glorious 
rainbow,  suddenly  cast  upon  a  mountain- 
side of  opposite  Inveruglas,  spanned  the 
whole  glittering  fairy  realm  with  its  great 
arch  of  incommunicable  splendour.  The 
place  of  Rob  Roy's  cavern  was  seen,  as  the 
boat  glided  down  Loch  Lomond,  —  a  snug 
nest  in  the  wooded  crag,  —  and,  after  all  too 
brief  a  sail  upon  those  placid  ebon  waters, 
I  mounted  the  coach  that  plies  between 
Ardlui  and  Crianlarich.  Not  much  time 
will  now  elapse  before  this  coach  is  displaced 
—  for  they  are  building  a  railroad  through 
Glen  Falloch,  which,  running  southerly 
from  Crianlarich,  will  skirt  the  western 
shore  of  Loch  Lomond  and  reach  to  Balloch 
and  Helensburgh,  and  thus  will  make  the 
railway  communication  complete,  continu- 
ous, and  direct  between  Glasgow  and  Oban. 
At  intervals  all  along  the  glen  were  visible 
the  railway  embankments,  the  piles  of 
"  sleepers,"  the  heaps  of  steel  rails,  the 
sheds  of  the  builders,  and  the  red  flag  of 
the  dynamite  blast.  The  new  road  will  be 
a  popular  line  of  travel.  No  land  "  that 
the  eye  of  heaven  visits  "  is  lovelier  than 
this  one.    But  it  may  perhaps  be  questioned 


315  IMPERIAL    RUINS. 

whether  the  exquisite  loveliness  of  the 
Scottish  Highlands  will  not  become  vulgar- 
ised by  over-easiness  of  accessibility.  Se- 
questration is  one  of  the  elements  of  the 
beautiful,  and  numbers  of  people  invariably 
make  common  everything  upon  which  they 
swarm.  But  nothing  can  debase  the  un- 
conquerable majesty  of  those  encircling 
mountains,  I  saw  "the  skyish  head'.'  of 
Ben  More,  at  one  angle,  and  of  Ben  Lui  at 
another,  and  the  lonely  slopes  of  the  Gram- 
pian hills  ;  and  over  the  surrounding  pas- 
ture-land, for  miles  and  miles  of  solitary 
waste,  the  thick,  ripe  heather  burnished 
the  earth  with  brown  and  purple  bloom  and 
filled  the  air  with  dewy  fragrance. 

This  day  proved  capricious,  and  by  the 
time  the  railway  train  from  Crianlarich  had 
sped  a  little  way  into  Glen  Lochy  the  land- 
scape was  once  more  drenched  with  wild 
blasts  of  rain,  Loch-an-Beach,  always 
gloomy,  seemed  black  with  desolation. 
Vast  mists  hung  over  the  mountain-tops 
and  partly  hid  them  ;  yet  down  their  fern- 
clad  and  heather-mantled  sides  the  many 
snowy  rivulets,  seeming  motionless  in  the 
impetuosity  of  their  motion,  streamed  in 
countless  ribands  of  silver  lace.  The  moun- 
tain ash,  which  is  in  perfect  bloom  in  Sep- 


IMPERIAL    RUINS.  3I9 

tember,  bearing  great  pendent  clusters  of 
scarlet  berries,  gave  a  frequent  touch  of 
brilliant  colour  to  this  wild  scenery.  A 
numerous  herd  of  little  Highland  steers, 
mostly  brown  and  black,  swept  suddenly 
into  the  picture  as  the  express  flashed  along 
Glen  Lochy,  and  at  beautiful  Dalmally  the 
sun  again  came  out  with  sudden  transient 
gleams  of  intermittent  splendour ;  so  that 
gray  Kilchurn  and  the  jewelled  waters  of 
sweet  Loch  Awe,  and  even  the  cold  and 
grim  grandeur  of  the  rugged  Pass  of  Bran- 
der,  were  momentarily  clothed  with  tender, 
golden  haze.  It  was  afternoon  when  I 
alighted  in  the  seaside  haven  of  Oban ;  yet 
soon,  beneath  the  solemn  light  of  the  wan- 
ing day,  I  once  more  stood  amid  the  ruins 
of  Dunstaffnage  Castle  and  looked  upon 
one  of  the  most  representative,  even  as  it 
is  one  of  the  most  picturesque,  relics  of  the 
feudal  times  of  Scottish  history.  You  have 
to  journey  about  three  miles  out  of  the  town 
in  order  to  reach  that  place,  which  is  upon 
a  promontory  where  Loch  Etive  joins  Loch 
Linnhe.  The  carriage  was  driven  to  it 
through  a  shallow  water  and  across  some 
sands  which  soon  a  returning  tide  would 
deeply  submerge.  The  castle  is  so  placed 
that,  when  it  was  fortified,  it  must  have 


320  IMPERIAL    RUINS. 

been  well-nigji  impregnable.  It  stands 
upon  a  broad,  high,  massive,  precipitous 
rock,  looking  seaward  toward  Lismore  isl- 
and. Nothing  of  that  old  fortress  now  re- 
mains except  the  battlemented  walls,  upon 
the  top  of  which  there  is  a  walk,  and  por- 
tions of  its  towers,  of  which  originally  there 
were  but  three.  The  roof  and  the  floors 
are  gone.  The  courtyard  is  turfed,  and 
over  the  surface  within  its  enclosure  the 
grass  grows  thick  and  green,  while  weeds 
and  wild-flowers  fringe  its  slowly  moulder- 
ing walls,  upon  which  indeed  several  small 
trees  have  rooted  themselves,  in  crevices 
stuffed  with  earth.  One  superb  ivy-tree, 
of  great  age  and  size,  covers  much  of  the 
venerable  ruin,  upon  its  inner  surface,  with 
a  wild  luxuriance  of  brilliant  foliage.  There 
are  the  usual  indications  in  the  masonry, 
showing  how  the  area  of  this  castle  was 
once  subdivided  into  rooms  of  various 
shapes  and  sizes,  some  of  them  large,  in 
which  were  ample  fireplaces  and  deeply 
recessed  embrasures,  and  no  doubt  arched 
casements  opening  on  the  inner  court. 
Here  dwelt  the  early  kings  of  Scotland. 
Here  the  national  story  of  Scotland  be- 
gan. Here  for  a  long  time  was  treasured 
the  Stone  of  Destiny  (Lia  Fail)  before  it 


IMPERIAL    RUINS.  32 1 

was  taken  to  Scone  Abbey,  thence  to  be 
borne  to  London  by  Edward  I.,  in  1296, 
and  placed,  where  it  has  ever  since  re- 
mained, and  is  visible  now,  in  the  old 
coronation  chair  in  the  chapel  of  Edward 
the  Confessor,  at  Westminster.  Here 
through  the  slow-moving  centuries  many 
a  story  of  love,  ambition,  sorrow,  and  death 
has  had  its  course  and  left  its  record.  Here, 
in  the  stormy,  romantic  period  that  followed 
1745,  was  imprisoned  for  a  while  the  beau- 
tiful, intrepid,  constant,  and  noble  Flora 
JNIacdonald  —  who  had  saved  the  person 
and  the  life  of  the  fugitive  Pretender,  after 
the  fatal  defeat  and  hideous  carnage  of 
Culloden.  What  pageants,  what  festivals, 
what  glories  and  what  horrors  have  those 
old  walls  beheld  !  Their  stones  seem  agon- 
ised with  ghastly  memories  and  weary  with 
the  intolerable  burden  of  hopeless  age  ;  and 
as  I  stood  and  pondered  amid  their  gray 
decrepitude  and  arid  desolation,  —  while 
the  light  grew  dim  and  the  evening  wind 
sighed  in  the  ivy  and  shook  the  tremulous 
wall-flowers  and  the  rustling  grass,  —  the 
ancient,  worn-out  pile  seemed  to  have  a 
voice  and  to  plead  for  the  merciful  death 
that  should  put  an  end  to  its  long,  consum- 
ing misery  and  dumb  decay.    Often  before, 

X 


322  IMPERIAL    RUINS. 

when  standing  alone  among  ruins,  have  I 
felt  this  spirit  of  supplication,  and  seen 
this  strange,  beseechful  look,  in  the  silent, 
patient  stones  :  never  before  had  it  appealed 
to  my  heart  with  such  eloquence  and  such 
pathos.  Truly  nature  passes  through  all 
the  experience  and  all  the  moods  of  man, 
even  as  man  passes  through  all  the  experi- 
ence and  all  the  moods  of  nature. 

On  the  western  side  of  the  courtyard  of 
Dunstaffnage  stands  a  small  stone  building, 
accessible  by  a  low  tiight  of  steps,  which 
bears  upon  its  front  the  sculptured  date 
1725,  intertwined  with  the  letters  AE.  C. 
and  LC,  and  the  words  Laus  Deo.  This 
was  the  residence  of  the  ancient  family  of 
Dunstaffnage,  prior  to  1810.  From  the 
battlements  I  had  a  wonderful  view  of  ad- 
jacent lakes  and  engirdling  mountains,  — 
the  jewels  and  their  giant  guardians  of  the 
lonely  land  of  Lorn,  —  and  saw  the  red  sun 
go  down  over  a  great  inland  sea  of  purple 
heather  and  upon  the  wide  waste  of  the 
desolate  ocean.  These  and  such  as  these 
are  the  scenes  that  make  this  country  dis- 
tinctive, and  that  have  stamped  their 
impress  of  stately  thought  and  romantic 
sentiment  upon  its  people.  Amid  such 
scenes  the  Scottish  national  character  has 


IMPERIAL    RUIXS.  323 

been  developed,  and  under  their  influence 
have  naturally  been  created  the  exquisite 
poetry,  the  enchanting  music,  the  noble  art 
and  architecture,  and  the  austere  civilisation 
of  imperial  Scotland. 

After  dark  the  rain  again  came  on,  and 
all  night  long,  through  light  and  troubled 
slumber,  I  heard  it  beating  on  the  window- 
panes.  The  morning  dawned  in  gloom  and 
drizzle,  and  there  was  no  prophetic  voice  to 
speak  a  word  of  cheer.  One  of  the  expedi- 
tions that  may  be  made  from  Oban  compre- 
hends a  visit  to  Fingal's  Cave,  on  the  island 
of  Staffa,  and  to  the  ruined  cathedral  on 
Saint  Columba's  island  of  lona,  and,  in- 
cidentally, a  voyage  around  the  great  island 
of  Mull.  It  is  the  most  beautiful,  romantic, 
diversified,  and  impressive  sail  that  can  be 
made  in  these  waters.  The  exf)editious 
itinerant  in  Scotland  waits  not  upon  the 
weather,  and  at  an  early  hour  this  day  I 
was  speeding  out  of  Oban,  with  the  course 
set  for  Lismore  Light  and  the  Sound  of 
Mull. 


324  THE    LAND    OF    MARMION. 


XXIV. 

THE    LAND   OF    MARMION. 

BERWICK-UPON-TWEED,  September 
8,  1890.  — It  had  long  been  my  wish  to 
see  something  of  royal  Berwick,  and  our 
acquaintance  has  at  length  begun.  This  is 
a  town  of  sombre  gray  houses  capped  with 
red  roofs ;  of  elaborate,  old-fashioned,  dis- 
used fortifications  ;  of  dismantled  military 
walls  ;  of  noble  stone  bridges  and  stalwart 
piers  ;  of  breezy  battlement  walks,  fine  sea- 
views,  spacious  beaches,  castellated  re- 
mains, steep  streets,  broad  squares,  narrow, 
winding  ways,  many  churches,  quiet  cus- 
toms, and  ancient  memories.  The  present, 
indeed,  has  marred  the  past  in  this  old 
town,  dissipating  the  element  of  romance 
and  putting  no  adequate  substitute  in  its 
place.  Yet  the  element  of  romance  is  here, 
for  such  observers  as  can  look  on  Berwick 
through  the  eyes  of  the  imagination  ;  and 
even  those  who  can  imagine  nothing  must 
at  least  perceive  that  its  aspect  is  regal. 


THE    LAND    OF    MARMION.  525 

Viewed,  as  I  had  often  viewed  it,  from  the 
great  Border  bridge  between  England  and 
Scotland,  it  rises  on  its  graceful  promon-^ 
tory,  —  bathed  in  sunshine  and  darkly- 
bright  amid  the  sparkling  silver  of  the  sea, 
—  a  veritable  ocean  queen.  To-day  I  have 
walked  upon  its  walls,  threaded  its  princi- 
pal streets,  crossed  its  ancient  bridge,  ex- 
plored its  suburbs,  entered  its  municipal 
hall,  visited  its  parish  church,  and  taken 
long  drives  through  the  country  that  en- 
circles it ;  and  now  at  midnight,  sitting  in 
a  lonely  chamber  of  the  King's  Arms  and 
musing  upon  the  past,  I  hear  not  simply  the 
roll  of  a  carriage  wheel  or  the  footfall  of  a 
late  traveller  dying  away  in  the  distance, 
but  the  music  with  which  warriors  pro- 
claimed their  victories  and  kings  and  queens 
kept  festival  and  state.  This  has  been  a 
pensive  day,  for  in  its  course  I  have  said 
farewell  to  many  lovely  and  beloved  scenes. 
Edinburgh  was  never  more  beautiful  than 
when  she  faded  in  the  yellow  mist  of  this 
autumnal  morning.  On  Preston  battlefield 
the  golden  harvest  stood  in  sheaves,  and 
the  meadows  glimmered  green  in  the  soft 
sunshine,  while  over  them  the  white  clouds 
drifted  and  the  peaceful  rooks  made  wing 
in  happy  indolence  and  peace.     Soon  the 


326  THE    LAND    OF    MARMION. 

ruined  churcii  of  Seton  came  into  view,  with 
its  singular  stunted  tower  and  its  venerable 
gray  walls  couched  deep  in  trees,  and  around 
it  the  cultivated,  many-coloured  fields  and  the 
breezy,  emerald  pastures  stretchnig  away  to 
the  verge  of  the  sea,  A  glimpse  —  and  it 
is  gone.  Bu'6  one  sweet  picture  no  sooner 
vanishes  than  its  place  is  filled  with  another. 
Yonder,  on  the  hillside,  is  the  manor- 
house,  with  stately  battlement  ard  tower, 
its  antique  aspect  softened  by  great  masses 
of  clinging  ivy.  Here,  nestled  in  the  sunny 
valley,  are  the  little  stone  cottages,  roofed 
with  red  tiles  and  bright  with  the  adornment 
of  arbutus  and  hollyhock.  All  around  are 
harvest- fields  and  market-gardens,  —  the 
abundant  dark  green  of  potato-patches  be- 
ing gorgeously  lit  with  the  intermingled 
lustre  of  millions  of  wild-flowers,  white  and 
gold,  over  which  drift  many  flights  of  doves. 
Sometimes  upon  tlie  yellow  level  of  the  hay- 
fields  a  sudden  wave  of  brilliant  poppies 
seems  to  break,  —  dashing  itself  into  scarlet 
foam.  Timid,  startled  sheep  scurry  away 
mto  their  pastures  as  the  swift  train  flashes 
by  them.  A  woman  standing  at  her  cottage 
door  looks  at  it  with  curious  yet  regardless 
gaze.  Farms  teeming  with  plenty  are  swiftly 
traversed,  their  many  circular,  cone-topped 


THE  Land  of  marmion.        327 

hayricks  standing  like  towers  of  amber. 
Tall,  smoking  chimneys  in  the  factory  vil- 
lages flit  by  and  disappear.  Everywhere 
are  signs  of  industry  and  thrift,  and  every- 
where also  are  denotements  of  the  senti- 
ment and  taste  that  are  spontaneous  in  the 
nature  of  this  people.  Tantallon  lies  in  the 
near  distance,  and  speeding  toward  ancient 
Dunbar  I  dream  once  more  the  dreams  of 
boyhood,  and  can  hear  the  trumpets,  and 
see  the  pennons,  and  catch  again  the  silver 
gleam  of  the  spears  of  Marmion,  Dunbar 
is  left  behind,  and  with  it  the  sad  memory 
of  Mary  Stuart,  infatuated  with  barbaric 
Bothwell,  and  whirled  away  to  shipwreck 
and  ruin,  —  as  so  many  great  natures  have 
been  before  and  will  be  again,  —  upon  the 
black  reefs  of  human  passion.  This  heed- 
less train  is  skirting  the  hills  of  Lammer- 
moor  now,  and  speeding  through  plains  of 
a  fertile  verdure  that  is  brilliant  and  beau- 
tiful down  to  the  margin  of  the  ocean. 
Close  by  Cockburnspath  is  the  long,  lonely, 
melancholy  beach  that  well  may  have  been 
in  Scott's  remembrance  when  he  fashioned 
that  weird  and  tragic  close  of  the  most 
poetical  and  pathetic  of  his  works,  while, 
near  at  hand,  on  its  desolate  headland,  the 
grim  ruin  of  Fast  Castle,  —  which  is  deemed 


328  THE    LAND    OF    MARMIOiV. 

the  original  of  Ms  Wolf's  Crag,  —  frowns 
darkly  on  the  white  breakers  at  its  surge- 
beaten  base.  Edgar  of  Ravenswood  is  no 
longer  an  image  of  fiction,  when  you  look 
upon  that  scene  of  gloomy  grandeur  and 
mystery.  But  do  not  look  upon  it  too 
closely  nor  too  long  —  for  of  all  scenes  that 
are  conceived  as  distinctively  weird  it  may 
truly  be  said  that  they  are  more  impressive 
in  the  imagination  than  in  the  actual  pros- 
pect. This  coast  is  full  of  dark  ravines, 
stretching  seaward  and  thickly  shrouded 
with  trees,  but  in  them  now  and  then  a 
glimpse  is  caught  of  a  snugly  sheltered 
house,  overgrown  with  flowers,  securely  pro- 
tected from  every  blast  of  storm.  The  rest 
is  open  land,  which  many  dark  stone  walls 
partition,  and  many  hawthorn  hedges,  and 
many  little  white  roads  winding  away 
toward  the  shore :  for  this  is  Scottish  sea- 
side pageantry,  and  the  sunlit  ocean  makes 
a  silver  setting  for  the  jewelled  landscape, 
all  the  way  to  Berwick. 

The  profit  of  walking  in  the  footsteps  of 
the  past  is  that  you  learn  the  value  of  the 
privilege  of  life  in  the  present.  The  men 
and  women  of  the  past  had  their  oppor- 
tunity and  each  improved  it  after  his  kind. 
These  are  the  same  plains  in  which  Bruce 


THE    LAND    OF    MARMIOX.  329 

and  Wallace  fought  for  the  honour  and 
established  the  supremacy  of  the  kingdom 
of  Scotland.  The  same  sun  gilds  these 
plains  to-day,  the  same  sweet  wind  blows 
over  them,  and  the  same  sombre,  majestic 
ocean  breaks  in  solemn  murmurs  on  their 
shore.  "Hodie  mihi,  eras  tibi " — as  it 
was  written  on  the  altar  skulls  in  the 
ancient  chui'ches.  Yesterday  belonged  to 
them  ;  to-day  belongs  to  us  —  and  well  will 
it  be  for  us  if  we  improve  it.  In  such  an 
historic  town  as  Berwick  the  lesson  is 
brought  home  to  a  thoughtful  mind  with 
convincing  force  and  significance.  So  much 
has  happened  here  —  and  every  actor  in  the 
great  drama  is  long  since  dead  and  gone  ! 
Hither  came  King  John,  and  slaughtered 
the  people  as  if  they  were  sheep,  and  burnt 
the  city  —  himself  applying  the  torch  to  the 
house  in  which  he  had  slept.  Hither  came 
Edward  I.,  and  mercilessly  butchered  the 
inhabitants,  — men, women,  and  children,  — 
violating  even  the  sanctuary  of  the  churches. 
Here,  in  his  victorious  days.  Sir  William 
Wallace  reigned  and  prospered  ;  and  here, 
when  Menteith's  treachery  had  wrought  his 
ruin,  a  fragment  of  his  mutilated  body  was 
long  displayed  upon  the  bridge.  Here,  in 
the  castle,  of  which  only  a  few  fragments 


3jO  THE    LAND    OF    MARMION. 

now  remain  (these  being  adjacent  to  the 
North  British  railway  station),  Edward  I. 
caused  to  be  confined  in  a  wooden  cage 
that  intrepid  Countess  of  Buchan  who  had 
crowned  llobert  Bruce  at  Scone.  Hither 
came  Edward  III.,  after  the  battle  of  Hali- 
don  Hill,  which  lies  close  by  this  place,  had 
finally  established  the  English  power  in 
Scotland.  All  the  princes  that  fought  in 
the  wars  of  the  Roses  have  been  in  Ber- 
wick and  have  wrangled  over  the  possession 
of  it.  Richard  III.  doomed  it  to  isolation. 
Henry  VII.  declared  it  a  neutral  state.  By 
Elizabeth  it  was  fortified,  —  in  that  wise 
sovereign's  resolute  and  vigorous  resistance 
to  the  schemes  of  the  Roman  Catholic  church 
for  the  subjugation  of  her  kingdom.  John 
Knox  preached  here,  in  a  church  on  Hide 
Hill,  before  he  went  to  Edinburgh  to  shake  . 
the  throne  with  his  tremendous  eloquence. 
The  picturesque,  unhappy  James  IV.  went 
from  this  place  to  Ford  Castle  and  Lady 
Heron,  and  thence  to  his  death,  at  Flodden 
Field.  Here  it  was  that  Sir  John  Cope  first 
paused  in  his  fugitive  ride  from  the  fatal 
field  of  Preston,  and  here  he  was  greeted  as 
affording  the  only  instance  in  which  the 
first  news  of  a  defeat  had  been  brought 
by  the  vanquished  general  himself.      And 


THE    LAND    OF    MARMION.  33 1 

witliin  siglit  of  Berwick  ramparts  are 
those  perilous  Fame  islands,  where,  at  the 
wreck  of  the  steamer  Forfarshire,  in  I'SSS, 
the  heroism  of  a  woman  wrote  upon  the 
historic  page  of  her  country,  in  letters  of 
imperishable  glory,  the  name  of  Grace 
Darling.  There  is  a  monument  to  her 
memory  in  Bamborough  churchyard.  Im- 
agination, however,  has  done  for  this  region 
what  history  could  never  do.  Each  foot  of 
this  ground  was  known  to  Sir  Walter  Scott, 
and  for  every  lover  of  that  great  author 
each  foot  of  it  is  hallowed.  It  is  the  Bor- 
der Land,  —  the  land  of  chivalry  and  song, 
— the  land  that  he  has  endeared  to  all  the 
world  —  and  you  come  to  it  mainly  for  his 
sake. 

"  Day  set  on  Norham's  castled  steep, 
And  Tweed's  fair  river,  broad  and  deep, 
And  Cheviot's  mountains  lone." 

The  village  of  Norham  lies  a  few  miles 
west  of  Berwick,  upon  the  south  bank 
of  the  Tweed,  —  a  group  of  cottages  clus- 
tered around  a  single  long  street.  The 
buildings  are  low  and  are  mostly  roofed 
with  dark  slate  or  red  tiles.  Some  of 
them  are  thatched,  and  grass  and  flowers 
grow  wild  upon  the  thatch.  At  one  end  of 
the  main  highway  is  a  market- cross,  near 


332  THE    LAND    OF    MARMION. 

to  which  is  a  little  inn.  Beyond  that 
and  nearer  to  the  Tweed,  which  flows  close 
beside  the  place,  is  a  church  of  great  antiq- 
uity, set  toward  the  western  end  of  a  long 
and  ample  churchyard,  in  which  many 
graves  are  marked  with  tall,  thick,  perpen- 
dicular slabs,  many  with  dark,  oblong 
tombs,  tumbling  to  ruin,  and  many  with 
short,  stunted  monoliths.  The  church  tower 
is  low,  square,  and  of  enormous  strength. 
Upon  the  south  side  of  the  chancel  are  five 
windows,  beautifully  arched,  —  the  dog- 
toothed  casements  being  uncommonly  com- 
plete specimens  of  that  ancient  architectural 
device.  This  church  has  been  "  restored  "  — 
the  south  aisle  in  1846,by  I,  Bononi;  the  north 
aisle  in  1852,  by  E.  Gray.  The  western  end 
of  the  churchyard  is  thickly  masked  in  gTeat 
trees,  and  looking  directly  east  from  this 
point  your  gaze  falls  upon  all  that  is  left 
of  the  stately  Castle  of  Norham  —  built  by 
Flamberg  of  Durham  in  1121,  and  restored  by 
another  Prince  of  that  See  in  1174.  It  must 
once  have  been  a  place  of  tremendous  for- 
titude and  of  great  extent.  Now  it  is  wide 
open  to  the  sky,  and  nothing  of  it  remains 
but  roofless  walls  and  crumbling  arches,  on 
which  the  grass  is  growing  and  the  pendent 
bluebells  tremble  in  the  breeze.     Looking 


THE    LAND    OF    MARMIOX.  ^33 

through  the  embrasures  of  the  east  wall  you 
see  the  tops  of  large  trees  that  are  rooted  in 
the  vast  trench  below,  where  once  were  the 
dark  waters  of  the  moat.  All  the  court- 
yards are  covered  now  with  sod,  and  quiet 
sheep  nibble  and  lazy  cattle  couch  where 
once  the  royal  banners  floated  and  plumed 
and  belted  knights  stood  round  their  king. 
It  was  a  day  of  uncommon  beauty  —  golden 
with  sunshine  and  fresh  with  a  perfumed 
air ;  and  nothing  was  wanting  to  the  per- 
fection of  solitude.  Near  at  hand  a  thin 
stream  of  pale  blue  smoke  curled  upward 
from  a  cottage  chimney.  At  some  distance 
the  sweet  voices  of  playing  children  mingled 
with  the  chirp  of  small  birds  and  the  occa- 
sional cawing  of  the  rook.  The  long  grasses 
that  grow  upon  the  ruin  moved  faintly,  but 
made  no  sound.  A  few  doves  were  seen, 
gliding  in  and  out  of  crevices  in  the  mould- 
ering turret.  And  over  all,  and  calmly  and 
coldly  speaking  the  survival  of  nature  when 
the  grandest  works  of  man  are  dust,  sounded 
the  rustle  of  many  branches  in  the  heedless 
wind. 

The  day  was  setting  over  Norham  as  I 
drove  away,  —  the  red  sun  slowly  obscured 
in  a  great  bank  of  slate-coloured  cloud, — 
but  to  the  last  I  bent  my  gaze  upon  it,  and 


334  THE    LAND    OF    MARMION. 

that  picture  of  ruined  magnificence  can 
never  fade  out  of  my  mind.  The  road 
eastward  toward  Berwick  is  a  green  lane, 
running  between  harvest-fields,  which  now 
were  thickly  piled  with  golden  sheaves, 
while  over  them  swept  great  flocks  of  sable 
rooks.  There  are  but  few  trees  in  that 
landscape  —  scattered  groups  of  the  ash 
and  the  plane  —  to  break  the  prospect.  For 
a  long  time  the  stately  ruin  remained  in 
view,  —  its  huge  bulk  and  serrated  outline, 
relieved  against  the  red  and  gold  of  sunset, 
taking  on  the  perfect  semblance  of  a  colos- 
sal cathedral,  like  that  of  lona,  with  vast 
square  tower,  and  chancel,  and  nave :  only, 
because  of  its  jagged  lines,  it  seems  in  this 
prospect  as  if  shaken  by  a  convulsion  of 
nature  and  tottering  to  its  momentary  fall. 
Never  was  illusion  more  perfect.  Yet  as 
the  vision  faded  I  could  remember  only  the 
illusion  that  will  never  fade — the  illusion 
that  a  magical  poetic  genius  has  cast  over 
those  crumbling  battlements ;  rebuilding 
the  shattered  towers,  and  pouring  through 
their  ancient  halls  the  glowing  tide  of  life 
and  love,  of  power  and  pageant,  of  beauty, 
light,  and  song. 

THE    END. 


NOTE. 

The  Poems  which,  under  the  title  At  Ves- 
per Time,  were  associated  with  the  foregoing 
sketches,  in  previous  editions  of  Gray  Days 
and  Gold,  have  heen  omitted  here.  They 
will,  however,  be  included  in  a  new  edition, 
shortly  to  be  published,  of  Wanderers  —  un- 
der which  title  a  collection  of  the  author's 
principal  Poems  has  been  for  some  time  in 
circulation. 


This  book  is  DUE  on  the  last 
date  stamped  below 


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